The American Student
by ShinigamiFangirl
Summary: Ichigo's class gets a shock when they get an American 13 year old girl transfering to their class. But Ichigo and his group know from day 1 that she's not normal. One thing is certain- she absolutely loves picking on Hitsugaya. No pairings. Read AN.
1. News of the American Student

**The American Student**

_A/N: This idea just popped into my mind and I knew I had to turn it into a fic. I know where this is going for the most part (Well actually no, I don't). I'm warning you that this fic will entirely ignore the facts that Ichigo, Chad and Renji are training right now and that Orihime was kidnapped. Let's all pretend that they have another year to go until Aizen attacks. I repeat, just pretend it. Well let's get on with the story. Also, I'm aware that they don't have school right now, pretend they do._

**Disclaimer: I don't own bleach.**

"Normal"- Japanese _"Italics"- English_ _Italics out of quotes- thoughts._

Chapter One: News of the American Transfer Student

Ichigo sat down at his desk in class and stared out the window. Rukia and him had only stopped arguing moments before about whether or not people would ask Hitsugaya if he skipped grades again today like they did last week. It was a usual Monday morning, otherwise. As their teacher came in the class settled into their seats. The teacher did their usual role call and then she said something interesting.

"Well, I have something to announce." The teacher said. The class shut up and they listened. She sounded unsure of how they would react to what she was about to say but she continued on. "Tomorrow we are getting a new student, an American student." There were a few murmurs of interest among the students.

"Does the new student know Japanese?" Mizuiro asked.

"Yes, I was told that she is fluent in Japanese."

"So it's a girl?" another student asked.

"Yes."

"What's her name?"

"Bard Claire. Now no more questions, I need to tell all of you something important about her." The teacher took a deep breath and then spoke, "She's only thirteen years old." She finished hurriedly so that her words were almost slurred together. The class was silent for a moment and then she got the reaction she was expecting.

"WHAT?!?" about half the class yelled at once.

"How will she keep up with our class if she's still in middle school?"

"You're kidding us right?"

"There is no way a thirteen year old will keep up, she won't know half the stuff!"

"Oh, I bet she's short like Hitsugaya!" One of the girls squealed.

"Who are you calling short?" Hitsugaya said in a warning voice.

"Hey, Taicho. Now you'll have someone besides Rukia who's your height!"

"Shut up, Matsumoto."

"I wonder what she's like?"

"I bet she's blond since she's American."

"Who says all Americans are blond?" Finally the teacher couldn't take it any more.

"Shut up and listen!" She yelled over all the other voices and the class silenced. "This is basically happening because the Americans are trying to prove that their schooling is as good as ours. They want to prove that an eighth grader can keep up with a class of tenth graders. Now I expect none of you to treat her badly because she's younger or different, got it?" the class nodded and they got on with their day.

Throughout the day the murmurs and guesses about the new student were everywhere. Even as Ichigo, Rukia, Ishida, Chad, Orihime, Tatsuki, Matsumoto, Hitsugaya, Renji, Ikkaku, and Yumichika left the school at the end of the day people were talking about it. Finally Orihime brought it up as Tatsuki left the group and headed for karate practice.

"So really, what do you think she is going to be like? She has to be smart if she is going to keep up with us but that's all we really know besides her name and age." Orihime said.

"Well, her last name sounds English or German so she is probably of European descent." Ishida reasoned. "Also I'm guessing about a five feet, three inches tall cause Americans tend to be taller than Asians."

"Ishida, I don't even want to know how you know that sort of stuff." Ichigo said. "But I think that it doesn't matter what we think because we'll find out tomorrow whether we know anything about her or not."

"True." Everyone else said and eventually they all went their separate ways and went home.

Meanwhile the new student was on an airplane to Japan. Claire couldn't say that she wasn't happy she was going to Japan; she love anime, manga, their foods, and had always wanted to go there. _Also, _Claire thought hopefully, _anything that might get me away from hollows is entirely welcome. _She touched the mark on the lower left side of the back of her neck that she knew had a flower (1) in the middle surrounded by three little Japanese symbols; two of them said ten and the other said eleven, they were changing numbers that represented what seal she was on. Currently she was on the tenth seal but when the final number turned eleven she would be on a new seal.

The plain was almost there and an attendant came to tell her that a man named Nakamoto-san was going to be the one waiting at the airport for her. Claire said thanks to her and the attendant left Claire to her thoughts of the hollows, shinigami, and normal souls that she saw every day.

_"We have now reached the Japanese International Airport near Karakura, Japan. Please wait till we land to move and have an enjoyable stay in Japan." _A cheerful voice said over the airplane's speakers.

After Claire got off the airplane and had gotten a large cart for all her luggage, knowing even more of it had been shipped ahead of time to Nakamoto-san for him to put in her new apartment where she'd be living alone until the American Education People said she could come back, Claire found Nakamoto-san and he led her to a large van to put all her stuff in. She was going to spend a night at a hotel before she went to school and then she would go to her apartment after her first day at school.

"So are you nervous about school at all?" Nakamoto-san said as he looked back at Claire who was fiddling with her necklace.

"Not really. Just because I'm younger doesn't mean I'm dumber than them. Also it's not like I'm here to make friends so who cares if they like me or not." Claire said as she looked down at her necklace; it was an old one that her great-grandpa gave her when she was five and she couldn't take it off unless she wanted to cut the black cord that it held it around her neck. The charm on it was a skull with a bright blue flame behind it (2).

Nakamoto-san was somewhat worried about her. He had seen her act naturally around people of her age or younger and act fine around her teachers when he visited America to discuss her arrangements and to see how she would do with other kids. They hit a slight snag when she was placed in a class of tenth graders to observe how she would act. The problem was she became somewhat shy and hardly spoke to any of them and she didn't look any of them in the eye when she did speak, otherwise it went fine; she got perfect grades and could easily be in her last year of high school with the brains she has. Also she excelled at forms of defense such as martial arts. He just was worried that older kids might pick on her.

They arrived at the hotel and checked in, they would be staying in separate rooms for the night and then Nakamoto-san would drive Claire to her new school. Then he would drop off the rest of her luggage at her apartment along with some addresses of stores and other things she might need to visit.

When Claire got into her room she changed into her sleep wear and went to brush her teeth. When she pulled her head back up after spitting out the toothpaste she noticed that currently one eye was a light brown and the other was a medium green. She laughed to herself a bit about her eyes that often changed colors; her friend had once even said Claire's eyes turned a shocking red when she was angry. Of course this was coming from her friend that somehow also had the strange ability to see shinigami, hollows, and normal souls so she figured that the red had been the color of her reiatsu at the time which often affected her eye color besides the normal color-changing.

As she walked back into the bed area of the hotel room she pulled her reddish-brown hair- which now was almost more red than brown from all the time she had spent outside recently- out of its ponytail and flopped onto the cushy bed to get a good nights sleep for tomorrow, not even bothering to turn off the lights.

_A/N: So how did you like it? I want to know so please read and review. Also, does anyone know the name of Ichigo's teacher? Well now here are the footnotes:_

(1) The flower on her marks flower is the same as the flower of the tenth squad's symbol. Like the one that shows up black on Matsumoto and Hitsugaya when they have their limiters released, it's the same picture.

(2) The symbol on Claire's necklace is the same one as the one that's on the bottom of Urahara's cane and the one on Rukia's glove thing that she uses to drag Ichigo out of his body.

_Also I'm telling you now that for those who haven't realized (which I'm sure most of you did) I already flipped Claire's name so if she was in America her name would be said Claire Bard. Next I'm saying that I recently discovered that Ichigo is only 5 feet 8 inches tall (that amused me cause he seems taller, but like I said Asians tend to be smaller)._


	2. First Day

The American Student

**The American Student**

A/N: Here, I'll give you another chapter not that long after I just put out the first but I really like this one I think so I'll see how it goes. I'd appreciate it if you review. Well read on and hopefully you will like my story.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

"Japanese" "_English_"_ Thoughts _also –"what ever is in here"- means that is what someone hears over the phone and what language depends on font.

Chapter Two: First Day

It was now morning and Claire was up and getting dressed. Her new school had uniforms and she didn't care for the girls uniform much. It was a white button-down shirt, long black socks that reached most of the way up her shins, an optional red bow (she wasn't going to wear it), black round-toe mildly dressy shoes, and the part the hated about the outfit: the short (it only came down to about two inches above her knees) pale gray-beige colored skirt. Once dressed and ready to go, she grabbed her suitcase and pulled her school bag, with all her school stuff in it, out of it and walked out into the hallway where Nakamoto-san greeted her.

"Good morning, Claire-san." Nakamoto-san said cheerfully.

"Morning." Claire said in her usual tone of voice. They walked down stairs and put her bags in the car before returning inside to eat breakfast. Once they ate breakfast they got back in the van and drove off towards Karakura High, her new school.

"Here is the address to your apartment and the key to it. I will leave some papers on the bed in your room that will have other information such as any stores you might need to go to, the bank which the organization that sent you here has set up an account at and filled up with enough money to get you through roughly three years here so you should have enough, and places that you might like such as a candy store. Also the near by clinic's address is on there if you need to see a doctor or need some medication for things like food poisoning." Nakamoto-san said. They pulled up to the school and Claire opened the car door. "Do your best and remember to go straight to the Principal's office when you get inside. Bye!"

"Bye, Nakamoto-san. I guess I'll hear from you eventually." Clair said as she hurried off inside the building with the other students. When Claire got inside the first thing she noticed was that she was as tall as some of the guys and taller than almost every girl. The second thing she noticed was that she had absolutely no clue where the principal's office was. As she tried to make her way to a sign so she could read it and hopefully find out where the principal's office was she bumped into a boy with black-hair that went part way down his neck and accidentally bumped his headphones off of him.

"I'm sorry!" Claire said quickly, not making any eye contact with the boy. The boy grabbed his headphones but did not put them back on. Instead, he looked at her and spoke.

"It's okay, this time in the morning sometimes it's easy to bump into people." The boy said then he looked at her and realized that he hadn't seen her before. "I haven't seen you before, are you new?"

"Yes, I'm just starting today." Once again as Claire said this she made sure to make no eye contact. Claire didn't know why, but it had always been hard for her to talk with and make eye contact with people who were only two or three years older than her when it was easy for her to do those things with most adults and people seven or eight years older.

"Oh, are you the new transfer student from America?" the boy said, this time he had picked up on her slight American accent when she spoke.

"Yes, and I'm a bit lost. Do you know where the principal's office is?" Claire asked hurriedly, she didn't want to be late on her first day.

"Yeah it's right over there." The boy pointed to a door with a sign on it that clearly read 'Principal's Office'. "Well I'll see you in class. My name is Mizuiro."

"Thanks, my name is Bard Claire." And they separated and went their ways. Claire headed for the door and knocked on it.

"Who is it?" A gentle male voice asked.

"Bard Claire, the American transfer student. I was told to come here." Claire said.

"Oh yes. Come in." the voice said. Claire opened the door to see an elderly looking man sitting at the desk. They began to talk and discuss what was going on.

Meanwhile in Ichigo's classroom most people were talking about the new student they were supposed to get today. There were very few people not wondering about what she'd be like. Even Tatsuki was trying to guess what she'd be like.

"Seriously, I think she'll be blond since she's American." Chizuru said, "If she's cute she might even be my type!"

"I'm telling you, just because she's American doesn't mean she's blond. And how sick is it that you're saying a thirteen year old might be your type. She's two years younger than you!" Tatsuki said. Mizuiro walked by and heard what Tatsuki said and stopped.

"Yeah. She's not blond, she has really reddish-brown hair and is about as tall as Ichigo." Mizuiro said.

"Wait, you saw her already? When?" Mahana (1) asked in surprise.

"When I was walking in she bumped into me and then asked me where the principal's office was. She wouldn't make eye contact with me though, she's kind of shy I guess." Mizuiro said and then walked over to Ichigo, Asano, and Chad. They talked for a bit and then the teacher came in and told them to sit down.

"Alright, so as you all know the new student is coming today," The teacher said and then there was a knock on the sliding door.

"She's here." The voice of the principal said and then you could hear his footsteps as he walked off.

"You can come in, Bard-san." The teacher said as the class turned their attention to the door.

Outside the door Claire was half frozen. She could feel some strong reiatsus coming from the classroom, but she knew she had to go in so she did.

Into the classroom walked a tall, fair skinned girl with brown hair so red that someone could have easily said her hair was red instead of just a really reddish-brown. Her hair went just below her shoulder blades and was pulled back into a ponytail. She was thin but you could tell she was active by her muscular legs and arms. She looked to the class and nodded.

"Class, this is Bard Claire. Bard-san, do you want to say anything?" The teacher said. Claire nodded and turned her attention to the class, but once again not making any eye contact.

"Um… Well, she said my name and everything so um…" Claire stuttered a bit but kept her composure and bowed her head a bit, "I look forward to going to school here." She then raised her head and looked to the teacher, but then a student spoke.

"So you're from America? Your Japanese is really good."

Clair blushed the slightest bit and said "Thank you."

"You're really tall!" A red-haired girl said happily.

"Um… I guess. I'm only just above average height back home…" Claire said awkwardly.

"How tall are you?" Another girl asked.

"About five feet, seven and a half inches." Claire was now hoping the teacher would stop this question asking frenzy. The questions were a bit odd and she just rather sit down and figure out whose reiatsu she was sensing. Thankfully the teacher seemed to understand and gestured for the class to shut up.

"You guys can ask her questions during lunch or some other time," The teacher said, "but for now just let her sit down and get on with class." Claire was relieved that people would ask her these questions when they were in smaller groups. Smaller groups of older kids were easier to deal with than in large groups. Also this way she might be able to narrow down were the reiatsu was coming from.

"Um… Bard-san, go sit behind Kuchiki-san and next to Hitsugaya-kun. Kuchiki-san and Hitsugaya-kun, raise your hands so she can see where you are." The teacher said. When she finished, a petite raven-haired girl and a short white-haired boy raised their hands and Claire went over and sat down. Class began but not without Claire noticing the bright orange hair of the boy sitting next to Kuchiki-san and the reiatsu coming from him, Kuchiki-san, and Hitsugaya-kun.

Half an hour later the thing that Claire thought her friends were smart enough not to do, they did. While they were going over some math problems a familiar ring tone was heard: "_Woke up with yawn it's dawn and, I'm still alive. Turned on my radio to start up new day. As goddamn DJs chattered how to survive..._"_ Oh shit! Why the hell are they texting me right now?, _Claire thought franticly. Unfortunately the people around her had noticed it, too.

Claire carefully slid her cell phone out of her bag and flipped it open silently.

_**Emily: Oi, Claire! R u there? Is it safe to call u right now?**_

Claire quickly texted her back: _**Baka! I'm in the middle of class! What is so important that u need to call?**_

_**Emily: Oh, sry. I'm going to kill u 4 leaving! I just killed like the third hollow today and had to hide from the freaks with swords!**_

Claire checked to make sure nobody was watching and answered: _**You mean the lazy ones that claim we shouldn't kill hollows, that's their job? Those ones? **_

_**Emily: yeah. I still think it's weird that by blood u r one of them. Your great-grandpa was nothing like them. But I guess it is kind of cool 4 u 2 be a shinigami while u r still alive.**_

Claire was getting nervous and wanted to end this quick: _**Em-chan, I don't have time 4 this right now. I'll call u when school is out 4 the day, k? Also, yeah, it would be cool if I wasn't sealed. But thankfully I'm on the tenth seal out of thirteen so in a few years I will run out of seals. (Hopefully) well g2g. **_She hit send and closed her phone, carefully sliding it into her bag. She was relieved that it seemed nobody had noticed. She was wrong. Next to her Hitsugaya had noticed her texting and only managed to make out two words from her text, hollow and shinigami.

When lunch came Claire headed up to the roof, her old school didn't allow students on the roof but the principal here said that she was welcome to go up there. She noticed that she was the first one up and chose to sit in a corner and lean up against the sturdy railing as she ate, looking over her shoulder at the buildings below and next to the roof. She thought back to what Emily had said about her great-grandpa; the man who gave her the necklace around her neck and the man who had sealed her shinigami powers so that she couldn't leave her body, but she could use here reiatsu to call forth her zanpakto or just call forth reiatsu to solidify around her arms to make killing a hollow easier. The only problem was that using any reiatsu for her was painful because of the seal. So painful that she might pass out from it. But because she had that seal reiatsu built up pressure and so frequently showed up as her eye color to those with reiatsu.

Meanwhile Hitsugaya told the others what he saw as they went up to the roof.

"Are you sure that's what you read? That girl is so shy, I just can't see her knowing about hollows or shinigami." Matsumoto asked her taicho.

"I'm sure. But it is possible that she can only see them, I doubt she knows anything more than that. But we should still try and find out without directly asking her." Hitsugaya said. "Because if she can then she is at risk for being attacked by hollows."

"We should wait till tomorrow when she might be a bit more comfortable here." Rukia said right as Orihime came up the stairs, dragging Tatsuki with her. "Orihime, what are you doing?"

"Me and Tatsuki-chan are going to go say hi to Bard-san! Want to come?" Orihime asked happily.

"Um sure. Ichigo come on, let's go say hi!" Rukia said as she grabbed Ichigo's arm and dragged him over towards Claire.

"Hey, wait! Why do I have to go, too?" Ichigo protested.

"Because I say so." Rukia said as they got closer to Claire.

Claire noticed the kids coming over to her and waited for them to speak first. She also quickly noticed that all four of them had reiatsu. _Geez, is this class just filled with people with reiatsu?_, Claire wondered.

"Can we sit here?" The red-haired girl asked cheerfully. Claire wondered why they wanted to sit by her but then realized that this was the girl who pointed out that she was tall. The girl honestly didn't seem that bright so she figured there was no reason.

"Fine by me." Claire said and the three girls and one boy sat down.

"So your name is Bard Claire, right?" The muscular girl with short black hair asked.

"Yes." Claire said simply. She was still not making eye contact with them. Heck, she wasn't even really looking at them. They didn't seem fazed by the fact that she didn't look at any of them, except for the orange-haired boy with them, it seemed to tick him off a bit. She could tell by the annoyance that was distinct in his reiatsu.

"So you're really only thirteen?" Kuchiki-san asked.

"Yep." Claire was getting a little annoyed by the simple questions but she didn't tell them that.

"Oh, by the way I'm Inoue Orihime." The red-haired girl said and the others followed by saying their names.

"Arisawa Tatsuki."

"Kuchiki Rukia."

"Kurosaki Ichigo." Claire's heart nearly missed a beat when she heard the name Kurosaki and almost wasn't sure. Claire looked right at the boy and asked.

"What was your name? I didn't quite hear you."

"Kurosaki Ichigo." This time Claire knew she'd heard him right.

--Flash Back—

"_Now remember, Claire, if you ever see a shinigami run away from them and if they do catch you don't tell them your name. Don't trust other shinigami. There are only three shinigami besides myself that you can trust." William Bard said to his great-granddaughter. She looked up at him with questioning eyes and asked._

"_Why can't I trust them?" the five-year-old Claire asked. She was rubbing the seal that her great-grandpa had just put on her neck. She also felt the cold metal of the new necklace her great-grandpa had tied around her neck and told her never to take off. _

"_Because shinigami are supposed to be dead already and you are still alive. They will wonder how you attained the power of a shinigami and I will be in trouble. That's why I sealed you so that hopefully they won't find out you are the descendant of a shinigami. The only thing that can break the seal is that necklace. You must hold it to the mark with your own hands for five seconds. The thirteen seals will break and you will come out of your body as a shinigami like you did yesterday."_

"_Didn't you just say there were three I could trust besides you? Who are they?" Claire asked._

"_Their names are Shihouin Yoruichi, Urahara Kisuke, and Kurosaki Isshin. I doubt that you will ever meet them but if you do you can trust them."_

--End Flash Back—

_Kurosaki, _Claire thought, _I wonder if he's related to Kurosaki Isshin. _The others stared at her for a moment, it was hard to miss the recognition that had flashed across her face at the name Kurosaki.

"_Woke up with yawn it's dawn and I'm still alive. Turned on my radio to start up new day. As goddamn DJs chattered how to survive…" _Claire pulled out her phone to look at the new text.

"So that was your phone that went off earlier. Who keeps texting you?" Tatsuki asked.

"My friend Emily." Claire said as she stared at the message.

**Emily: you really need to get your ass back here so I can get some sleep. I just got cut by one idiot's zanpakto after I killed a hollow.**

Claire messaged back fast, she knew zanpakto wounds hurt a lot because she got cut by them once. _**They attacked you because you did their job 4 them? Wow, they r dense. We wouldn't have to do their job 4 them if they were better at it. How is your wound?**_

_**Emily: Yeah, they r pretty stupid. My wound is fine, I'm concentrating my reiatsu on it so it is healing at a decent pace.**_

Claire was relieved. She would feel guilty if her friend got cut because she was covering for her while she was gone. _**Well I g2g cause I'm at lunch at the people near me are wondering what I'm texting you about. I'll call you later when it's okay, k?**_

_**Emily: K. u better call or else! And u will have to tell me all about your day. Bye!**_

Claire looked forward to talking to her friend. _**K, bye.**_

"What were you guys texting about?" Ichigo asked bluntly.

"Nothing." Claire said. Even if she did tell them they wouldn't believe her. All of the sudden Claire felt it, there was a hollow nearby. At the same time she felt it six cell phones went off. _Shit, why now when I can't leave because of all of the people here?_, Claire thought. At that point Hitsugaya got up from where he was sitting and ran off.

"Kuchiki-san, was that your phone that went off?" Claire asked. She knew it had to be more than a coincidence that six cell phones went off at the same time the hollow appeared.

"Um… yes. It's nothing though." Rukia said. She had seen Claire whip her head around to face the direction of the hollow. It was certain now to Rukia that Claire could see hollows and then probably shinigami, too.

A few minutes later Hitsugaya came back and resumed eating lunch. Claire was curious now because there was no way that it had to be a coincidence that Hitsugaya went running only a few moments after a hollow appeared and came back only about a minute after it disappeared. She had figured out that they weren't normal, she knew that much, but exactly how not normal they were she still didn't know. _I have to be careful, _Claire thought, _if I let my emotions flare even the slightest, any emotion at all, then they might see the reiatsu affect my eye color and get suspicious. _

Lunch was almost over and Claire began to fiddle with her necklace. Rukia looked up and saw her fingering something around her neck. She saw it was the charm on her necklace and that at least part of it was blue. _I wonder what the charm is…, _Rukia wondered, _I guess I can look at it later. _

When lunch was over they all went back down to the classroom where most students were already gathered. Claire took her seat behind Rukia as the teacher went to the front of the classroom where her desk was.

"Well class, guess what we're going to do now!" the teacher said enthusiastically, she waited for no one to respond, "a pop quiz that will have just a few questions about each subject!" the class groaned as the teacher passed out the quiz. It was just a short fifteen-question quiz. "Just raise your hand when you're done and I'll come get your paper. Begin."

The whole room was filled with the sound of pencils on paper. In a few moments a hand shot up.

"Well it seems Bard-san is the first to finish." The teacher said as she walked over to Claire and collected her quiz. "Why don't I grade it since you are the first one done." Claire nodded and the teacher went back to her desk and graded her quiz. Within the next few minutes students hands popped up one by one and they waited for the teacher to get them. When she came to collect Hitsugaya's the teacher also handed Claire her quiz and mouthed the words 'good job'. Claire looked down at her paper and saw a red 100 written on it. Claire smiled to herself.

Fifteen minutes after the quiz started everyone was finished and the teacher had just collected the last paper. She went back to her desk then turned to face the class again.

"I figured since we got a new student today we could do something that would teach others a bit about ourselves. I want you to draw two pictures: one of an object that's precious to you and one of an animal or person that you care about. You have the next three hours." She said and then left the class to their work.

Two and a half hours later most people had just finished the task and Claire was putting the finishing touches on hers when Orihime, Chizuru, Michiru (2), and Tatsuki walked up to Claire.

"Wow, those are really good!" Orihime said as she stared at Claire's artwork.

"Thanks. I'm pretty good at drawing I guess. Well, I am when it's something I've seen a lot." Claire said as she put the finishing touches on her black cat.

"What's that from?" Michiru asked as she pointed at Claire's first picture. Claire turned around and showed them her necklace.

"Why's it important?" Tatsuki asked.

"My great-grandpa gave it to me when I was five. It was the year before he died and I've never taken it off. I can't take it off unless I cut it." Claire said. All they said then was 'oh'.

"What about the black cat?" Chizuru asked as she pointed to the cat in Claire's second picture.

"That's my cat back home. His name is _Midnight._" Claire said. At that point Matsumoto and Rukia walked over.

"Oh, Kuchiki-san, Rangiku-san. Come look at Bard-san's pictures! They're really good!" Orihime said. And so Rukia and Matsumoto moved closer and got a closer look. They both saw the picture of the necklace and recognized it instantly.

"Is that the necklace you're wearing right now? Where did you get it at?" Rukia asked Claire as if she would want the same one. Claire showed her the necklace around her neck to answer her first question and gave her the same explanation she gave the others about where she got it.

"Alright class, since all of you are done already why don't a few of you come up to share your pictures. Um let's see, how about Bard-san since nobody knows much about you." The teacher said. So Claire got up and showed the class her pictures. She explained them and then sat down. For the next twenty minutes more people shared their art and then returned to their seats until about five minutes until class was over. Then they turned in their work and waited for the bell to ring.

As they left for class Ichigo, Hitsugaya, Rukia, Matsumoto, Ikkaku, Renji, Yumichika, and Orihime were all that remained in the room. Chad and Ishida had already left but Orihime stayed because Matsumoto was staying at her place.

"You guys all saw Bard-san's drawing of her necklace, right?" Hitsugaya asked and everyone nodded. "This pretty much means that she can see ghosts, hollows, and shinigami. This also means she is endanger of getting attacked by hollows." Once again everyone nodded. "Also I think that there might be more to it than just that. If someone gave her that then that someone had to have had something to do with shinigami, I doubt that symbol is a coincidence." They continued to talk for a little longer and then they all left.

As Ichigo and Rukia headed towards his place they heard a familiar voice.

"_You did what to his sword?…Up a tree?… Well he deserves it… Has he found it yet?… To bad… My day was fine, I'll tell you more about it when I get home so no one can hear me… Well I'll call you back when I find my apartment, that is __**if**__ I find it. I'm lost… See you too… bye." _ They turned the corner just in time to see Claire putting her phone back into her bag. She was then looking at a piece of paper and when she looked up again she saw Ichigo and Rukia. She walked over to them.

"Um.. I'm kind of lost. Do either of you know where Tokyo avenue is?" Claire asked and as usual didn't make eye contact with either of them. Ichigo had gotten a bit fed up with her not looking at someone when she spoke. So before Rukia could answer Ichigo told her what he thought.

"We'll tell you if you actually make eye contact with us when you speak." Ichigo said. Both Rukia and Claire looked at him in shock. So Claire looked him straight in the eye and opened her mouth.

"Okay. So do you know where it is?" Claire asked again but Ichigo was still shocked by the current color of her eyes: Crayola-crayon orange (most likely from the shock of being told off about not looking at the person when she spoke). Claire noticed his shock and guessed correctly about what he was shocked about. "Just wondering, what color are my eyes right now?"

"Orange. I'm just going to guess, but I'd say that isn't your normal color." Ichigo said as he recovered. Rukia seemed interested in the color of her eyes.

"I don't exactly have a normal eye color, my eyes tend to be brown or green but occasionally they turn some highly unnatural color like red or electric blue." Claire said. Rukia was interested a bit about her eyes but then taking into account what they knew about her she decided that the unnatural colors were her reiatsu. "But anyhow, do you know where Tokyo avenue is or not? I really want to find my apartment."

"Yes, we know where it is. Inoue, you know who I'm talking about, lives on that street and probably in the same apartment complex. We'll show you where it is." Rukia said as she and Ichigo led the way.__

"Here you are, this is the only apartment complex on this street so this must be the one you are looking for." Rukia pointed to the large building in front of them and it was the right address. So Claire walked up the stairs to the door on the upper right side and used her key to get inside. As she wandered farther she found that it was a four-roomed apartment; there was a small bathroom, a bedroom, a small living room, and a small kitchen. Nakamoto-san had already unpacked most things and put them away and all the furniture was set up. In the living room there was a TV and a table that was low to the ground and surrounded by floor cushions. The only thing that was left to do was unpack her clothes, books, laptop, and other small things that she had brought along.

After she was done unpacking completely (which had only taken about an hour) she realized that there was not food in the house so she looked at the list Nakamoto-san had given her and set off for the nearest grocery store, this time with a map. As she stepped out of her apartment and turned around to lock the door she heard a voice she recognized.

"Bard-san? Is that you?" It was Inoue. Claire turned around to see the cheerful girl standing at the door to the apartment next to her own.

"Oh, hi Inoue-san. Do you live there?" Claire asked as she gestured to the apartment door that was across from her own.

"Yeah, I was just leaving to go get some jelly. I didn't know you lived next door." Inoue said.

"Yeah, I just moved in today. I actually was heading to the grocery store, too. I don't have any food in the house yet so I needed to go buy some stuff." Claire just realized that she was actually still making eye contact with people when she spoke. _Kurosaki-kun's comment actually affected me, _Claire thought.

"Why don't we go together? I know!" Inoue said happily, "Why don't we have dinner together to celebrate your first day at school here!"

"Are you sure? I don't want to impose." Claire said.

"I'm sure! Do you care what we eat?" Inoue asked.

"Not really, I'm not very picky when it comes to food." Claire said.

"Then it's settled! We can go grocery shopping and then you can eat dinner with me tonight." So the two girls headed off to the grocery store and got what they needed. After Claire had put her purchases in her apartment she went to Inoue's door and knocked on it.

"Come in!" Inoue's voice answered. Claire opened the door and saw a living room almost identical to her own except for the personal things. The small table and shelving unit were exactly alike and so was the wall color. Clair took her shoes off and stepped on to the wood floor. She saw Inoue walk out of what she knew was the kitchen holding two plates that had something purple-ish on it. She didn't really care though and sat down on one of the floor cushions next to the table.

"Thanks for inviting me over, Inoue-san." Claire said as one of the plates was set in front of her.

"No problem. It's always better to eat with people and I live only with Rangiku-san so it's nice to have you over." Inoue said. Claire decided against asking Inoue why she lived alone, but instead she followed suit and took a bite out of the food like Inoue was doing. It was surprisingly good. They made small talk throughout the meal and when both had finished they started a new conversation.

"So what do you think of Karakura?" Inoue asked.

"I like it so far. I got lost earlier when trying to find my apartment, but Kurosaki-kun and Kuchiki-san showed me the way." Claire said.

"Yeah, Kurosaki-kun is nice that way." Inoue said. "So I was wondering, weren't your eyes green during lunch?"

"Probably. My eye color tends to change back and forth from brown to green a lot but occasionally they turn some weird color like red. What color are they now?" Claire found it somewhat amusing how Inoue was staring at her eyes, they were probably something like lilac or neon pink.

"They are kind of a silvery lilac color. I get what you mean by weird colors." Claire laughed a bit at this. Not exactly at the phrase itself but the way she said it half dazed by the color.

"It figures they would be some weird color like that. Oh by the way, do you know if a relative of Kurosaki-kun's runs the Kurosaki Clinic here in town?"

"Yeah, Kurosaki-kun's dad does. Why do you ask?"

"It was on this sheet that the guy who is sort of supposed to make sure I don't die while I'm here handed me along with the list of other things like the grocery store and a candy shop that I'm going to check out tomorrow after school."

"Oh, okay."

"Do you want to come with? I don't care if you bring anyone with you." Claire said.

"Okay!" Inoue said," You know, I wonder where Rangiku-san is…"

"Oh yeah, didn't you say she was living here with you?"

"Yeah, but she is out late sometimes so it doesn't really mater I guess."

"Okay. If it's normal than you shouldn't worry to much."

"You are right, Bard-san."

"Um… Inoue-san?"

"Yes?"

"Do you mind calling me Claire instead of Bard? I'm still not really used to being called by my family name."

"Okay. No problem, Claire-san."

"Thanks." Claire said and they continued to talk about random things until the door opened. Inside walked Matsumoto with a really full shopping bag.

"They had a great sale going on at this one store and so I -" Matsumoto had just noticed Claire sitting across from Inoue.

"Welcome back, Rangiku-san! I invited Claire-san over for dinner; she moved into the apartment next door and we both saw each other leaving so I invited her over." Inoue explained.

"Okay. I don't think we ever got to talk to each other, my name is Rangiku Matsumoto. I'm in your class." Matsumoto said as she stepped farther into the apartment.

"Oh yeah, I saw you sitting with Hitsugaya-kun and a few other people during lunch. My name is Bard Claire. Nice to finally talk to you." Claire said. All of a sudden Claire's phone went off and she looked at the caller ID and saw that it was Emily, she then remembered she had forgotten to call her. "Um.. can I step out for a minute to answer this?" The other two nodded and Claire stepped outside.

"_Oh my god, I'm so sorry I forgot to call!"_

_-"It's okay. So anyhow how was your day?"-_

"_Pretty good, two of my class mates helped me find my apartment and another one lives next door."_

_-"Hope they don't notice you leaving randomly to go kill hollows at odd hours."-_

"_That's the thing, I sense reiatsu coming from about a dozen people in my class."_

_-"Have fun with that problem. Well how's Japan?"-_ and so the girls continued to talk for a bit while inside Matsumoto was talking with Inoue.

"I'm surprised she actually made eye contact with me. She didn't do that at all earlier." Matsumoto said.

"Kurosaki-kun showed her how to get here, he probably said something to her about it." Inoue said.

"Just wondering, weren't her eyes brown earlier?" Matsumoto asked.

"Yeah, according to her, her eyes are normally green or brown but occasionally they turn a weird color like now." Inoue said.

"I wonder if the odd colors are from any reiatsu she has… The only thing weird about that is the fact that I don't sense any reiatsu coming from her." Matsumoto said.

And so eventually Claire came back in and they all chatted for a while until Claire left to get some sleep. But back in Inoue's apartment Inoue wondered what candy shop they were going to tomorrow.

_A/N: I'm so sorry this chapter turned out so long! Well I hoped you liked it and I think that for those of you who have paid close attention to Bleach you will know what candy shop I'm talking about. Well here are the footnotes: (1) Mahana is the girl who asked Rukia bluntly if she liked Ichigo in vol. 6 or in a flash back when she is running away just before Renji and Byakuya capture her. (2) Michiru is another girl who hangs out with Chizuru, Mahana, Orihime, etc. _

_Also: yes the ring tone that goes off when Claire gets a text is one of the Bleach opening themes. Once again I'm really sorry about this 6,000+word chapter, but it needed to be this long. I think a lot of these chapters might be really long. If I don't update tomorrow then I won't update for a little over a week because I'm going on vacation to California. Well Please review so I can find out what I'm doing wrong. Thanks for reading! _ __ __


	3. Candy Store

**The American Student**

_A/N: Well here is the next chapter. This chapter will reveal which "candy store" they are going to after school. Also, I want to clarify that Claire's friend Emily is a similar case to Orihime and Chad's. Emily is a long time friend of Claire's even before she was sealed so Emily was affected over time. She uses some unknown technique. I just wanted you to know. Well please review and enjoy the chapter._

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

See previous chapters for info on different fonts.

Chapter Three: Candy Store

Claire woke to the sound of beeping. She reached over and turned of her alarm as she got out of bed and got dressed. She moved into the bathroom and combed out her hair and brushed her teeth. Her eyes were a dull brown color this morning. She was tired; she didn't sleep well last night because a hollow appeared around midnight but by the time she got closer to it the hollow had already been killed, most likely (and unfortunately for her) by a shinigami. She poured the milk into her cereal and quickly ate.

She grabbed her bag and headed out the door and locked it. _It's kind of nice to live alone, this way my mornings are quiet, _Claire thought. When Claire got to the bottom of the stairs she noticed there was someone there. Claire recognized the girl to be Orihime's friend Arisawa Tatsuki. Tatsuki had also seen Claire.

"Bard-san, you moved into that empty apartment?" Tatsuki asked.

"Yeah. Just wondering, but are you waiting for Inoue-san?" Claire wondered.

"Yeah, we walk to school together in the mornings." Tatsuki replied. Then Tatsuki noticed her eyes. "Weren't your eyes green yesterday during lunch, because now they're brown."

"Who knows, my eyes change color a lot but normally they're either green or brown. They sometimes are weird colors like electric blue or apparently last night they were lilac."

"I've never seen eyes that change color like that. It's a little odd." Tatsuki commented. Claire just shrugged and headed off for school.

Claire found her way to school on time. Today she remembered to turn her phone on silent so that it wouldn't go off during class. She took her seat and decided to just watch people come through the door. Eventually she saw Rukia come through with Ichigo and then Tatsuki, Orihime, and Matsumoto come through the door. Orihime walked over to Claire and Matsumoto and Tatsuki followed.

"Claire-san, so it's okay if Rangiku-san and Tatsuki-chan come with us after school right?" Orihime asked. Claire nodded.

"I don't care who comes with, all we're doing is checking out a store that Nakamoto-san labeled 'convenience/ good candy selection'." Claire said.

"Candy store?" Rukia turned around and asked.

"Yeah, we're going to one after school. Want to come?" Matsumoto asked.

"Sure." Rukia replied.

"Ah, Orihime! I just remembered I have karate after school today, I can't go." Tatsuki said. "Sorry. Maybe some other time."

Orihime looked a little disappointed but she said okay. The teacher came in and everyone took their seats and the talking died down. The first part of the day went off without any troubles and they proceeded to lunch. Claire ended up sitting with Rukia, Tatsuki, Orihime, and Matsumoto (Matsumoto tried to make Hitsugaya sit with them but Hitsugaya threatened to take away her sake and give her paper work.).

Claire checked her phone quickly to see if she had any new texts. Sure enough, she had a text not from Emily but from Callie.

**Callie: I'm sooo sorry I didn't call or text yesterday! By the time I figured out the time difference it was like three in the morning your time. Well how was your first day? It must suck being the youngest… I really miss you and your bizarre eyes. Well I sure wouldn't mind going to school in Japan, maybe I'd get an A in their English classes. Text me back soon.**

Claire laughed, Callie had always been the type of person to try and figure out what might be a good time to text and not text until she knew. She gave her an answer: _**Well, I'm not dead yet so I'd say my first day was okay. It doesn't matter much that I'm the youngest because I'm taller than I think all of the girls and even a few guys. To my relief I think I'm not the only one who can see ghosts in this class (it almost worries me a bit that I'm not) but none of them can replace you and Em-chan. I'll try and call later. **_Callie couldn't see hollows and shinigami well but she believed Emily and Claire that they existed because she could clearly see normal souls and the normal souls had told her about them. It was kind of funny that her two best friends could see ghosts, too. But on the other hand that's probably the reason they were best friends.

"Your friend texted you again?" Orihime asked as Claire slid her phone back into her bag before she started to eat.

"Yeah, but not the same one as yesterday." Claire said as she ate some of the sushi she got at the store yesterday.

"You know, your eyes really are odd. They're a sunny yellow color right now." Tatsuki said. Claire was a little surprised that Tatsuki could see the colors that had to do with reiatsu, but on the other hand it doesn't take much reiatsu to see her weird eyes probably. The rest of the girls looked at her eyes and nodded in agreement that they were weird.

"Well at least it would really hard to kidnap and then impersonate me because of my eyes. Not that I'm planning on getting kidnapped any time soon." They all laughed a bit at her remark. For the majority of lunch they made small talk until six phones went off when Claire sensed a hollow. Claire turned around to try to see if she could see it from there but it was to far away.

"What are you looking at?" Rukia asked innocently.

Claire shook her head and said, "It's nothing." She turned around in time to see Renji run towards the entry to the roof and leave. And just as Hitsugaya had, her returned shortly after the hollow had vanished. They continued their small talk until the end of lunch.

The rest of the school day had been dull but passed quickly. Claire was now walking down the street with Rukia, Orihime, and Matsumoto towards the 'convenience/ good candy selection' store. Claire figured she could pick up some pain medication while she was there since it was also a convenience store because she wouldn't know when she would end up having to use a decent amount of her reiatsu to kill a hollow which would leave her with her whole body aching because of having to go against her seal to use reiatsu (especially her head hurt).

"So how much longer until we're there?" Rukia asked. She was getting nervous because she had walked this street before and it wasn't to go to a candy store.

"Um… here it is." Claire said as she looked at what appeared to be a small shop that had been there for quite some time. There were two kids out from that had matching shirts that had the stores name on there, Urahara Shoten.

"Claire-san, are you sure we're at the right place?" Orihime asked.

"Um… yep, it says on this sheet that the store's name is Urahara Shoten." Claire said. Matsumoto, Orihime, and Rukia all looked at each other as Claire walked ahead.

"I was afraid of this." Rukia whispered to Orihime and Matsumoto. "The store's cover is being a convenience store since they have to make money by selling stuff besides shinigami supplies from soul society illegally. Let's just hope that Urahara isn't here right now and that Tessai-san is in charge instead." They ran and caught up with Claire as they walked towards Jinta and Ururu. The store's door was closed so when they got up to Jinta and Ururu Claire spoke.

"Is the store open?" Claire asked.

"Yes." Said Ururu quietly. Jinta looked at Claire and then looked at the other three. He hadn't seen Claire before and hardly anyone came to this shop unless they were shinigami. So before Ururu could open the door Jinta questioned Claire.

"What do you want to buy?" Jinta asked. Claire's eyes turned a reddish-orange at the question, which startled Jinta at the sudden change in eye color.

"Well, I was told you had a decent selection of candy here and I hoped to buy some." Claire said as she obviously tried to hide her great annoyance with the boy. To Claire's surprise the door quickly slid open to reveal a blond-haired man dressed in all green with a fan. He was also wearing a white and green striped hat and wooden clogs. At this point Rukia wanted nothing better than to whack her head and a large blunt object.

"Why, yes! We do sell candy and a variety of other things. I'm the owner, Urahara." The strange man said and then the name clicked in her memories.

--Flash Back—

"_Their names are Shihouin Yoruichi, Urahara Kisuke, and Kurosaki Isshin. I doubt that you will ever meet them but if you do you can trust them."_

--End Flash Back—

_I wonder if he's related. Or maybe, _Claire thought, _it is actually him. _Claire tried not to let the recognition show on her face as she entered. There she saw what she had come for: lots of candy and among them her favorite of them all, pocky. Claire quickly rushed over to the pocky to check its price.

"I didn't expect to see you three here." Urahara said while Claire was busy with the pocky.

"We came with because she invited Orihime and Orihime invited Matsumoto and then Matsumoto invited me." Rukia said as she made her way into the store. "She didn't tell us the name of the store, though."

"Who is she any how?" Jinta asked as he watched Claire happily decide between flavors of pocky.

"A new classmate of ours from America." Orihime said. "Her name is Bard Claire. She's actually only thirteen." Urahara looked at Claire for a moment.

"Did you say Bard?" Urahara asked.

"Yes, her family name is Bard. Why, have you heard it before." Rukia said. She was interested why Urahara seemed to recognize the name.

"Nothing." Urahara said as he shook his head. Then he saw a familiar black cat walk into the room. "Ah, Yoruichi." Claire saw the cat also, but she couldn't recall where she'd heard the name before.

"Urahara-san, is that your cat?" Claire asked as she slowly walked toward the cat.

"You make it sound like I own her. She's a good friend but I can't say she's mine." He said as he watched Claire kneel down and pet Yoruichi. Besides allowing the girl to pet her, Urahara was surprised when he saw Yoruichi put her two front paws on Claire's left shoulder and look down. After a minute Yoruichi jumped walked off towards Urahara and Claire resumed choosing out pocky.

"Oh, it's so hard to choose between watermelon and grape since I'm trying to limit myself to four boxes." Claire said as she finally decided on the watermelon and put the other box down. She walked over to the register and placed her boxes of pocky and the bottle of painkillers on the counter and watched Urahara. As Urahara turned to face Claire and hand her the change he saw her necklace.

"That's an interesting necklace." Urahara said.

"Thanks. My great-grandpa gave it to me when I was five, just a year before he died." Claire said as she put her change back in her wallet. Then as she looked up at Urahara he noticed her eyes.

"Did your eyes change color?" Urahara asked.

"Most likely." Claire said and explained her eyes and then walked out the door with Rukia, Orihime and Matsumoto.

After they had left, Yoruichi jumped up onto the counter and spoke, "That girl has a reiatsu seal on the back of her neck. It's poorly done but there seems to be multiple seals. She probably can still use her reiatsu, though."

"I figured that she might at least be part shinigami, did you see her necklace?" Urahara asked and Yoruichi nodded. "I'm pretty sure I know who she is related to, also. The name and that necklace tipped me off."

"Whether she knows it herself or not that her relative was a former shinigami taicho is what I want to find out." Yoruichi said as she jumped down and walked off.

Rukia had already left their group as they headed for their homes. Claire was munching happily on her pocky as they walked. When they arrived at the apartment building they split up, Orihime and Matsumoto one way and Claire the other. When Orihime opened the door she found Hitsugaya sitting in the middle of the room.

"Taicho! How did you get in?" Matsumoto asked as she stepped through the door.

"You guys left the window open." Hitsugaya said. "Any how, I saw you two walking off with Rukia and Bard-san so I decided to wait until you two got back to ask where you went."

"The Urahara Shoten." Matsumoto said.

"What? Why the hell did you go there?" Hitsugaya asked in a surprised tone of voice.

"Bard-san was told that it had a good selection of candy by the man who is some what in charge of her while she's here." Matsumoto explained.

"Well, that's not the only reason I'm here. I know she's hiding something and I've seen her turn her head every time a hollow shows up. So tonight I'm going to stay on the roof and if a hollow shows up I bet that I'll see her running out her front door to go kill it." Hitsugaya said. "So for now I'm staying inside until it gets a little darker out."

Claire woke up suddenly in the middle of the night, there was a hollow. She quickly changed into some jeans and ran outside; forgetting to lock her door. Above on the roof a pair of blue-green eyes watched her leave the apartment and run in the direction of the hollow.

As Claire walked back ten minute later her whole body hurt and she felt as if she was going to pass out from the pain. She dragged herself through the door, which she'd left unlocked, and her eyes turned a bright orange from shock. Some one was sitting in her living room and she knew the person.

"H-Hitsugaya-kun?!?" Claire stammered as she flipped the light switch next to the door. "What the hell are you doing in my apartment?" She then asked furiously as her eyes darkened to a blood red and she regained her composure. "Answer. Now."

"I want answers from you." Hitsugaya said calmly yet with a threatening feeling to it.

"Like what?" Claire said as she tried to stay calm but it didn't help that her whole body hurt.

"Like why you left in the middle of the night and then come back looking as if you're about to collapse." Hitsugaya answered.

"Like hell I'll tell you what I was doing. You talk as if it's your business. It's not." Claire said sharply.

"Actually, if you are doing what I think you are doing then it is my business." Hitsugaya stated.

"And what is it that you are so sure I'm doing that you break into my apartment to confront me about?" Claire asked with a slight smirk. She was completely pissed off at him now.

"I think you went out to kill a hollow." Hitsugaya stated as if it's the most normal thing in the world to accuse someone of.

"What the hell is a hollow? Some sort of mutated dead tree? Look, I just wanted to take a walk because I couldn't fall asleep. Now if you don't mind I would like to have my apartment back to myself so I'm going to have to ask you to leave." Claire had to admit that she was a pretty good actress when she wanted to be.

"I'll leave, but there is no way that I'm going to believe you don't know what a hollow is." Hitsugaya said as he left. _Great, so there is at least one shinigami in my class, _Claire thought as she made her way to the kitchen to get some painkillers, _I just hope he's the only one._ After she took the painkillers she didn't even have enough energy to change clothes, she just dragged herself over to the bed and collapsed. Almost immediately she passed out and didn't wake up again until the next morning when her alarm went off.

_A/N: Well here's the last chapter you'll get for a little over a week. I think I might have rushed the chapter a little bit but otherwise I think I didn't screw up too badly. So what did you think about Hitsugaya confronting her or Claire meeting Urahara and Yoruichi? Please tell me in a review. This will allow me to give you another long chapter when I get back. Sort of like chapter two. Well thanks for reading._


	4. Curiousity Grows

**The American Student**

_A/N: Ha! I've found Ichigo's teacher's name: Ochi-sensei. So from now on when I refer to someone as Ochi-sensei I'm talking about the teacher. Well thanks to those of you who reviewed. It was a nice surprise when I finally got home from California to see that some people had reviewed. Well here is the next chapter. Also when this story finishes (which will take a long time) I already have somewhat of a plan for a sequel to this fic. Now on with the story!_

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

Refer to previous chapters for text key.

Chapter Four: Curiosity Grows

Thursday morning Claire woke up to a huge headache, which was the result of using a little to much reiatsu the night before. _Great, _Claire thought as she downed a few more painkillers and slid the small bottle into her school bag, _and I still have to go to school. How fun. _She finished getting ready for school. She knew the headache would only get worse once she got to school because when using reiatsu had caused her headache it hurt worse when she was near other people with high reiatsu and Hitsugaya and a few others definitely had high reiatsu.

When Claire sat down in her seat at school she was relieved that she was the first one there so that there was no other reiatsu to bother her. This peace only lasted for minute, a sharp pain shot through her head followed by the appearance of Ichigo, Rukia, Renji, and Hitsugaya. Claire propped her head up with her arm. She gripped her head tightly with her hand but tried not to make it obvious that she was in pain. Apparently she was bad at pretending her head wasn't killing her because Hitsugaya walked over towards his desk and quickly spoke after he sat down next to her.

"What's wrong? You look like you are in pain." Hitsugaya asked. He had seen Claire grip her head tighter when he had gotten closer. He was curious to find out what was causing the pain.

"Nothing. It's just a little head ache." Claire said through gritted teeth as the pain increased when Rukia and Ichigo sat down near by. They also seemed to be interested in why she seemed to be in so much pain. _Have they ever heard of suppressing their reiatsu?, _Claire thought as more of the students filled the room, some accompanied by an increase in pain. Claire let go of her head and pulled the tiny bottle of painkillers out of her bag and took a few more, she could already tell that the bottle of pills would be gone by the end of the school day.

"If it's only a little head ache then why did you just take those painkillers like they were candy?" Rukia asked. They could tell Claire was starting to get annoyed by the way her eyes began to take on a dark reddish-orange color.

"I told you it's nothing." Claire would have liked to add 'but it would be better if you'd suppress your reiatsu' but she restrained herself from doing so. Hitsugaya had noticed that she seemed to feel more pain when the students known to have high reiatsu entered or got closer. Hitsugaya decided to find out if reiatsu had anything to do with it by raising the amount he was giving off. Sure enough Claire quickly grasped her head again. Her eyes quickly changed to the brightest red you would ever see because of the amount of pain. She took a few more pills and swore in English under her breath.

"You really should go to the nurse if the pain is that bad." Rukia said and then looked at Hitsugaya and mouthed 'what the hell did you do that for?' when Claire wasn't looking.

"I'm fine. I get head aches like this all the time, I'm use to it." Claire said as the pills took a bit of the edge off the pain. Ochi-sensei then stepped into the room and the talking gradually died out.

By the time lunch started Claire's eyes were still red with pain. She hoped she could sit alone because those who normally sat with her would only cause her head ache to worsen. Of course Hitsugaya wouldn't care about that and he promptly brought Matsumoto towards Claire. They sat down and Claire took some more painkillers.

"Do you honestly expect me to believe the answer you gave me last night?" Hitsugaya asked casually.

"Do you honestly expect me to think you're sane?" Claire asked in return. "Because I honestly think you might have been exposed to fumes as a child after the crap I heard coming from your mouth last night." She knew he wouldn't react well to the next thing that came from her mouth. "Now that I think about it, if you were exposed to fumes that might explain why you're a midget whose hair turned white early." Hitsugaya looked as if he'd just been slapped in the face. He stood up, ready to hit her as hard as he could. Matsumoto and Renji, who had been sitting nearby at the time, sprang up and held Hitsugaya back as he calmed down a bit.

"Who the hell are you calling a midget whose hair turned white early?" Hitsugaya said, anger clear in his voice. Claire looked him straight in the eyes. Matsumoto and Renji hoped that Claire would back down and not say what they thought she was going to.

"You. I don't see any other white-haired midgets around here, do you?" She had said it and Matsumoto and Renji braced themselves because Hitsugaya looked as if he was about to strike, his reiatsu had murderous intent written all over it. Claire could sense it too but she didn't back down, instead she stood up to her full height and looked down at Hitsugaya. She knew she was being horribly rude and cruel but if this was what it took to get him off her back, she would do it.

"Taicho," Matsumoto said cautiously, "Think about what you are doing and whom you are about to attack."

Renji nodded, "Yeah, Hitsugaya-taicho. Bard-san is just a normal thirteen-year-old girl. You don't need to attack her." The word that she had been hearing finally clicked in Claire's head. They had been calling him taicho and she knew he was a shinigami, now she knew he was a shinigami taicho. That meant that anyone who had called him taicho was a shinigami, too. Matsumoto, Renji, Ikkaku, Yumichika, Rukia, and Ichigo (who had never called him taicho but Hitsugaya had insisted that he should) were all shinigami and now Claire knew it. Claire readied herself for his attack so she could dodge it and counter it.

"Oh no, I'm so scared of someone who looks like he should still be in elementary school." Claire said sarcastically. Renji and Matsumoto couldn't believe that Claire was still provoking Hitsugaya. Finally Hitsugaya threw off the two restraining him and threw a fast and hard kick at Claire, who easily evaded the attack and grabbed Hitsugaya's leg and flipped him over so he landed hard on his back. All of the other shinigami in the area, especially Hitsugaya, were shocked to see Claire dodge and counter Hitsugaya so easily. Claire knew it would've been a bit harder if Hitsugaya hadn't been so pissed off at her, since he was angry he wasn't thinking straight and so he was extremely easy to take down. Even the people who didn't know about Hitsugaya's rank were shocked to see a thirteen-year-old girl do that. The first person to speak was Tatsuki.

"Where the hell did you learn to do that?" Tatsuki asked Claire, who had now sat down again to eat.

"A relative." Claire answered before she took a bite of her last stick of pocky. Hitsugaya had stood up again and walked off down stairs without saying a word. Soon after, lunch ended and they had to head down to the classroom again. The rest of the day consisted of Claire taking painkillers and class going on as usual except for the occasional mutter of what happened on the roof during lunch. She had run out of painkillers about thirty minutes before the end of school and so she figured she would stop by the Urahara Shoten to get more painkillers and pocky.

Meanwhile Hitsugaya was still mad about lunch but was also curious as to what would cause a person's head ache to worsen because of reiatsu. He decided to visit Urahara after school and ask because he might know considering he was the former taicho of the twelfth squad.

The bell rang and people began to file out of the room. Claire held back a moment and flipped open her phone to find a text from Emily that made Claire extremely happy.

**_Emily: Hey Claire! Guess where I'm going to be eventually! Yep, Japan. I don't know when but I will eventually show up in Japan eventually and we're trying to work it out so that I can be with you during your classes, but not do any of the work. So how was today? Text me back soon._**

Claire responded quickly: _**Are you serious? You are really coming? Well my day has sucked; it consisted of a reiatsu head ache and me finding out a handful of my classmates are shinigami (one of them is even a taicho, how fun). Well I can't wait for you to come.**_

Claire headed for the door but was stopped by Tatsuki. Tatsuki stared at Claire for a bit.

"I want you to join the karate team." Tatsuki said bluntly. Claire didn't say anything for a while.

"Why?" Claire asked.

"Because you flipped Hitsugaya so easily up on the roof during lunch. I'm sure you would be a great addition to the team. I'm captain so I can arrange for you to join." Tatsuki said.

"Sorry, Arisawa-san. I'm going to have to refuse. I don't plan on joining any clubs or teams while I'm here." Claire said and tried to leave but Tatsuki stopped her again.

"At least come to a practice once, okay?" Tatsuki said. Claire nodded and left. She headed for the Urahara Shoten and when she got there she saw the two kids sweeping outside again.

"You're back again?" Jinta asked as Claire approached the door that was open this time.

"Yep. I need more painkillers and pocky." So Claire stepped through the doors and hoped that the pain caused by those two kids would die out a bit the farther she got from them. It did but as she made her way to where the painkillers were she heard some voices coming from the back. She couldn't make out what they were saying but she recognized one voice as Urahara's. After she had gotten her painkillers she was now once again deciding what flavors of pocky to buy. The two voices went quiet and the door to the back opened and there stood Hitsugaya and Urahara. Claire stared at Hitsugaya and Hitsugaya stared right back at Claire. Urahara decided to break the silence.

"Ah, Bard-san. Back already?" Urahara asked. Without tearing her gaze from Hitsugaya Claire answered.

"Yes, I ran out of pocky and painkillers today." Claire said. Finally she went back to her pocky.

"You might want to buy more painkillers than that one bottle. You ate them like candy today and if you do that again you'll need another bottle soon." Hitsugaya said. Just to be mean he released a bit more reiatsu and watched as she gripped the box of pocky she was holding tighter. She stood up and walked towards the register where Urahara was waiting for her to finish picking out what she wanted.

"I don't have the time or need to hear advice from midgets who can't even win fights they started." Urahara looked confused by what Claire had just said. Hitsugaya hadn't said anything about Claire beating him in a fight.

"I'm not a midget." Hitsugaya stated. Claire laughed a bit.

"I think a measuring tape would prove otherwise."

"And what do you mean by that?" Hitsugaya asked through clenched teeth. Urahara had never seen Hitsugaya loose his temper this easily. He had also never heard of Hitsugaya starting a fight and then loosing it.

"I mean that I've seen fourth graders that were taller than you. I've never seen one with white hair though. Honestly, did you breath in fumes a lot when you were younger?" Claire knew she was being mean but she'd do anything to distract Hitsugaya from her oddities. What he said next surprised her.

"Now. Outside. Rematch." Hitsugaya said. Claire smirked.

"Sure, just let me buy my stuff first." Claire bought her stuff and her and Hitsugaya went outside. Urahara followed and Yoruichi had been listening so she came, too. Jinta and Ururu stopped working to watch.

"When ever you're ready, attack me." Claire said. She was just standing normally and waited for Hitsugaya to strike. When he did it was even harder and faster than at lunch. He shot out his fist but missed as Claire easily moved. He then pivoted his body to try and hit her on the side of her neck with the side of his hand. He had reached forward to far and Claire made her move as she quickly kneed Hitsugaya in the stomach so hard that he actually had a bit of blood mixed with the spit he had just coughed up. Claire didn't stop at that; while his form was broken she kicked him on the side, which caused him to cough more spit up. He regained his balance in time to grab her leg when she tried to kick him again but Claire simply did some sort of back flip that caused Hitsugaya to be flipped over with Claire and land with a huge thud on his back. Claire stepped back.

"Had enough or do you want me to keep going till you're unconscious?" Claire said as she looked down at Hitsugaya. He was still pissed and still underestimating her, with that combination he couldn't win. As a response to Claire's question Hitsugaya stood back up. "Fine by me if you want to end this fight with you out cold." Claire knew that if he wasn't blinded by anger that he might have won, especially if he had been in his shinigami form. Hitsugaya seemed to have calmed down a bit and threw a punch at Claire's stomach, which she dodged but before she could reset herself he already was throwing a kick. Instinctively she grabbed the leg and pulled then quickly kicked up and hit the back of his neck as his head drew nearer. That finished up the fight because Hitsugaya was now unconscious.

"You might have had a chance if we were using swords." Claire said out loud to herself as she walked up towards the steps of the Urahara Shoten. Everyone sitting there seemed shocked at what had just occurred. Claire grabbed her bag. She looked at Urahara and bowed her head a bit. "Sorry about that. He was still angry from what happened during our lunch hour. I guess he wanted to prove that he could win but he was too angry to beat me. Anger is almost as bad as fear during fights, it clouds the mind and dulls the blade." Urahara was still a little shocked. He hadn't thought that this girl could have been this much like Bard William, but just seeing her do hand-to-hand combat left no doubt in his mind that she was related to him. That fighting style was the one he had used. It mostly relied on fast and hard kicks, speed, and great agility. It only used the hands when grabbing a part of the opponent to flip or pull them so you could still hold a sword while fighting. Claire could have been mistaken for William if you couldn't see what she looked like and only her movements.

"Bard-san." Urahara said.

Claire looked at him, "What?"

"Who taught you how to fight?"

"My great-grandpa. Why?"

Urahara left the 'why' unanswered. "What was his name?"

"Bard William. Why does it matter?" Claire knew why it mattered. Her fighting style was an exact replica of her great-grandpa's and Urahara had recognized it. This recognition confirmed that this man was Urahara Kisuke, former captain of the twelfth squad. Even though she knew she could trust him she still played dumb. He was in communication with Hitsugaya and Claire didn't want Hitsugaya finding out anything.

"Oh, it doesn't. I was just wondering because you fought so well." Urahara lied. He wasn't sure if he should say anything more. According to Hitsugaya she denied having the ability to see ghosts, but this, her eyes, her necklace, and the seal that Yoruichi claimed she had all seemed to contradict what Claire had told Hitsugaya. He didn't want to sound crazy if she was telling the truth, then he might lose a customer. Claire left the Urahara Shoten with some new information: Urahara of the Urahara Shoten was definitely Urahara Kisuke and that cat, she had finally remembered where she had heard the name Yoruichi. No matter how crazy it sounded she was sure that cat was Shihouin Yoruichi, former captain of the second squad.

Claire walked home but the people of the Urahara Shoten still were too shocked to move. Jinta had dropped his broom and it was quiet for a while.

"What the heck was that? That girl just kicked a taicho's butt in less than five minutes." Jinta asked as he picked up his broom. Claire had never struck him as a strong person. He had certainly not expected this. She had seemed fairly normal in every aspect except for her eyes. But what had just occurred seemed to prove otherwise. She had only used her hands once and she still managed to do that, she definitely wasn't normal.

"That was a demonstration of just a fraction of what that girl can probably do." Yoruichi said as she moved towards Hitsugaya to see how badly he had gotten hurt. "I really didn't expect it either."

"What do you mean by 'demonstration of just a fraction'? Yoruichi-san, what do you know about that girl?" Jinta asked.

"Not much, but from what we know she is the great-granddaughter of a former taicho of the Gotei thirteen. She appears to have inherited his shinigami powers. The thing is that when Hitsugaya confronted her about it she completely denied having the ability to see ghosts." Urahara said.

"That would explain some things. But I still don't get why she was able to take Hitsugaya down so easily." Jinta said.

"It was just like Bard-san said: anger is almost as bad as fear during fights, it clouds the mind and dulls the blade. Hitsugaya was angry and so he wasn't thinking straight when he fought. Normally he wouldn't have gotten so angry but it appears Bard-san is quite good with words and angering people (1)." Urahara explained, "Also she appears to be skilled at hand-to-hand combat."

"I'm certain she's lying about her lack of the ability to see ghosts. I just wonder why she's playing dumb and hiding it. I'm certain she's aware that there are others in her class with the same ability if Hitsugaya was right when he said that she was having a head ache that was affected by reiatsu." Yoruichi said as she began to hit Hitsugaya with her tail in attempt in wake him up.

"I'm curious about how much she knows about Soul Society, shinigami, and even her own great-grandfather. I'm pretty sure she is determined to keep Hitsugaya distracted from digging further into the matter by insulting him. But if she was aware of her great-grandfather's position when he was in Seireitei then why did she truthfully tell me, who I'm sure she noticed my reiatsu, her great-grandfather's name. It doesn't seem to make sense." Urahara said. Claire's actions confused him slightly, but they had to have some logic to them.

A few minutes later Hitsugaya woke up from Yoruichi's tail hitting him.

"Damn it!" Hitsugaya said angrily as he stood up from the ground. "I lost my focus." They all looked at him.

"Ah, you're awake. I was beginning to wonder how hard she hit you." Urahara said. This didn't help Hitsugaya's mood at all.

"Where did she go, anyhow?" Hitsugaya asked as he looked around.

"She left already." Yoruichi said. Hitsugaya looked disgruntled and left before anyone could say anything more.

The next couple days passed and it was now Sunday. Claire was sitting on a bench in the park. It was a nice day out in early September; the breeze had the slightest icy feeling to it that Claire loved. She had out her box of plain chocolate pocky and was munching on it happily. It was around three p.m. and the nearest people were the kids playing soccer on the soccer field. She enjoyed the faint noise of them in the distance. She decided to go walk by and watch them play. As soon as she got near them she sensed reiatsu coming from one of them. She focused harder and she decided that it was coming from the black-haired girl. They all looked about eleven or twelve, not much younger than herself. There were four of them, three boys and one girl. The girl seemed to give off the reiatsu. She walked past the field. She only half paid attention and she looked up at the sky for a moment.

"Look out!!!" Someone yelled and Claire looked and saw the ball headed straight towards her at a high speed. She didn't have time to dodge so she moved to the left a bit and raised her right leg in time to kick the ball back to them at an even greater speed then it was sent at her. _Good thing I used to play soccer or I would have ended up hurting myself, _Claire thought. She watched the ball as it flew straight in between them and hit the tree that was about a yard from the opposite side line. The four kids looked from Claire to the ball and back to Claire.

"Are you okay?" The black-haired girl asked as she ran up to Claire.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Was that you that kicked that ball over here?" Claire asked.

"Yep, sorry about that. The way you returned it was awesome. Do you play?" The girl asked.

"Thanks. I use to play but I quit once I started middle school." Claire said.

"Oh, you're in middle school?" the girl asked.

"I should be, but currently I'm in high school." Claire responded

"What do you mean by 'should be'?"

"I mean that I'm only thirteen but through some odd circumstances I was sent to Japan and put in the tenth grade." Claire said.

"Wait, you aren't from Japan?" the girl asked, she was surprised that she had such good Japanese.

"Nope, I'm a pure blooded American." Claire said. Now that the girl thought about it she could hear a slight American accent when Claire spoke.

"Oh, by the way, I'm Karin. Kurosaki Karin." Karin said.

"Kurosaki? Are you related to Kurosaki Ichigo?" Claire asked.

"Yeah, he's my older brother. Why? Are you in his class?" Karin asked.

"Yeah. Oh, I'm Bard Claire." Claire said. Then of course something had to go wrong that day, a hollow appeared. Claire immediately ran in the direction of the hollow, it was nearby in the park.

"Claire, don't go over there." Karin yelled before Claire could get to far. Claire turned around and stared at Karin. She was the sister of Ichigo so it would make sense if she could see the hollow.

"Why not?" Claire asked hurriedly. She really needed to get to the hollow, she could tell it was going to be a big one and it could do a lot of damage fast.

"Something tells me it would be bad if you went there." Claire smiled and said.

"I'm sure nothing bad will happen." Claire yelled as she ran off towards the hollow.

When she arrived she discovered a large insect-like hollow. Claire didn't want to waste time doing this in broad daylight so she immediately materialized her zanpakto. She noticed stingers surrounding its body so she had no choice but to release her zanpakto. If she finished it fast enough she wouldn't get a head ache the next day, she might pass out but there wouldn't be a head ache.

"Ensnare! Soshi Zassou (2)!" Claire yelled as she plunged her zanpakto into the ground. It seemed to melt into the ground and within seconds vines of fire and ice wrapped around the hollow. Another second passed and a vine that appeared to be made out of stone burst out of the ground and pierced the hollow's mask. As the hollow dissolved Claire resealed her zanpakto and dematerialized it. The whole fight ended in less than a minute. Claire hadn't used too much reiatsu so she was okay. The trouble was she felt a familiar reiatsu coming so she jumped into a tree and hopped from tree to tree as she escaped from the area.

Hitsugaya was using shunpo to get to the hollow as fast as possible. Then he heard something that was clearly the sound of a shinigami releasing their zanpakto but he didn't recognize the command, the zanpakto's name, or the speaker's voice. What he heard sounded like 'ensnare, Soshi Zassou' but he didn't recognize it. Less than a minute after he heard the command for the zanpakto to be released the hollow had disappeared. He got to the scene in time to feel an unfamiliar and quickly fading reiatsu (3).

When Claire got far enough away she dropped out of the tree she was in and leaned against it. She hoped Hitsugaya hadn't seen her. She opened up her box of pocky and pulled out a piece. Then her heart skipped a beat. She could feel reiatsu coming her way; thankfully it wasn't Hitsugaya's. It was Ichigo and Rukia. Her heart skipped a beat again as she saw them pass…in shinigami form. She had gotten good at acting like she couldn't see shinigami when they were right in front of her. The only reason the ones in America knew about her was because one had tried to look at her while she was naked and Claire kicked him out cold. Rukia and Ichigo noticed Claire, who was thankful that she had just gotten a text message and thus an excuse not to look anywhere but the screen of her phone.

**_Emily: You're kidding me! How many of them are there? One is a taicho; man your head had to have been hurting that day._**

Claire, who now noticed Ichigo and Rukia had stopped and were staring at her, responded: _**I think seven. And yes, my head was killing me. **_Even after Claire had finished texting she pretended to still be reading as she ate her pocky.

"Rukia, do you think Bard-san can see us? She seems to not notice us but Toshiro said that she should be able to. He's especially convinced since he saw her fight." Ichigo said. Claire had to hold back from showing any sign that she'd heard them. She didn't think that her fighting at that low of a level would give her away.

"She didn't respond to any of what you said so I think Hitsugaya-taicho might be wrong. Oi, Bard-san! Can you see us?" Rukia said as she joked around a bit. Claire had to restrain herself from laughing. Claire closed her phone, pulled out another piece of pocky and stared straight between them. She sang a bit and then stood up and walked off, leaving Ichigo and Rukia back by the tree.

Claire decided to pick up more pocky before she did anything else. She headed to the Urahara Shoten and once again was greeted by Ururu and Jinta. Before Jinta could say anything Claire spoke.

"Yes, I'm back again for more pocky." Claire said as she stepped through the opened door. Urahara was sitting on the rug in the middle of the store and when she stepped in he looked up.

"Bard-san, back for more pocky already? You really like that stuff don't you?" Urahara asked.

"Yeah. By the way, did you say anything to Hitsugaya-kun when he woke up after I knocked him out the other day? He seemed more ticked off than I thought he'd be after I beat him." Claire asked.

"No. Why would you think I did?"

"No reason, really. I just wondered." At that moment Claire noticed a figure on the ground and she gasped. It was Hitsugaya's gigai. But she wasn't supposed to know it wasn't a real body so she played dumb. "Oh my god! I think something is wrong Urahara-san! Hitsugaya-kun is just laying here," Claire said as she began to furiously shake Hitsugaya's soulless gigai, "And he's not waking up! Hitsugaya-kun! Hitsugaya-kun! Wake up! It's like he doesn't have a soul in his body!" Claire was restraining herself from laughing. She was having too much fun shaking and occasionally stopping to slap his gigai's face. His face would hurt a lot when he got back in his gigai.

Urahara had completely forgotten that Hitsugaya had left his gigai in the shop. He was really amused to see Claire panic and repeatedly attempt to 'wake up' Hitsugaya, which he was sure she knew that it wasn't actually him and just his gigai but she was still playing dumb.

"Um… Bard-san. It's okay, Hitsugaya-san just fell asleep and is a really heavy sleeper." Claire was amused by Urahara's explanation and stopped what she was doing and simply said 'okay'. Claire had a feeling that Urahara had caught on to her last time she had come to the Urahara Shoten but if he did he didn't say anything about it.

Claire was looking at flavors of pocky when Hitsugaya in shinigami form showed up. He walked into the store and didn't seem to notice Claire.

"The hollow was already dead when I got there. But I did hear something odd. I'm pretty sure I heard a shinigami release their zanpakto but I didn't recognize the zanpakto's name or the command used to release it. What I heard was 'ensnare, Soshi Zassou' but I've never heard that name before." Hitsugaya said. He was confused why Urahara wasn't saying anything. Urahara pointed in Claire's direction and Hitsugaya saw her and nodded. He walked over to his gigai and got in. The first thing he said when he got in was "What the hell? Did someone slap my face or something?" Claire smiled and looked at Hitsugaya.

"I tried to wake you up but you wouldn't wake so I used harsher methods. Then Urahara-san explained that you are a really heavy sleeper." Claire said as she tried to hide her obvious grin. Hitsugaya glared at Urahara who was also trying to hide his smile.

"Yes, Hitsugaya-san. Bard-san was extremely worried when you wouldn't wake." Urahara said while suppressing the urge to laugh.

"Idiot, you know it was just a gigai." Hitsugaya said. Claire gave him the blankest stare he had ever seen.

"Gigai?" then she pretended to connect a few things together, "If you are going to spout the same nonsense about honnows o-" Claire was interrupted.

"Hollows." Hitsugaya interrupted.

"Like it matters, its all complete crap anyhow. If you are going to start spouting crap like that again I really rather you just keep your mouth shut. I came here to shop, not to be bothered by some midget who insists that people call him taicho. Taicho of what? Some group of crazy people that believe their bodies aren't actually bodies, that they're something called a gigai or whatever and that their duty is to break into other people's homes at night and ask them if they've been out killing hollows at one a.m.? Honestly I think you have more than a few screws loose. So don't try and even utter another word or the next thing I know you'll be claiming that you are actually dead already or something." If there is one thing that Claire had learned over the years it's that if you actually tell the person what they are about to tell you and make sure that you say you don't believe it, they generally have a hard time coming up with a way to claim that you actually do know what they're talking about. "What is a gigai anyhow? Some sort of fake body?"

Hitsugaya couldn't think of anything to say besides what he did. "Well, yes." Claire laughed in a cruel, disbelieving tone.

"Yeah, like I'll believe a nut job like you." Claire said. She stood up and walked over to the register and Urahara followed and began to ring up the total. Hitsugaya was still a little annoyed. He stood up and headed for the door when he saw Urahara's cane and he remembered something, he had been holding onto Rukia's red glove that she used to push souls out of their bodies. He slid on the glove and Urahara saw what he was doing but to late, Hitsugaya had already made contact with Claire's head.

"Ow! What are you doing? Why'd you hit me?" Claire said as she stepped back from the shock of just being hit in the head. Hitsugaya was shocked; Claire was still standing in her body and the glove had had no effect on her. Urahara seemed more interested than shocked as to why the glove didn't work.

"What the… You should be in soul form right now." Hitsugaya said in confusion. Claire just shook her head.

"Even after I tell you I think you are nuts you still try and convince me. And by hitting me on the head, too! Wonderful tactic, just wonderful." Claire then saw the symbol on the glove, she knew that something like that wouldn't work on her, her seal made sure that nothing could take her out of her body except for the necklace that she was wearing and that was after she used the necklace to break the seal. Until then she was stuck in her body.

Hitsugaya left the store. Claire looked back at Urahara who was placing her pocky in a brown paper bag. He looked up at her.

"You've had a lot of practice with arguing with people like Hitsugaya and a few other certain classmates of yours, haven't you?" Urahara asked. Claire knew that he was talking about the other shinigami in her class. He knew that she knew that he had figured it out. Claire realized that he wasn't planning on telling Hitsugaya or any of the others about what he knew.

"Tons of practice. Most aren't as persistent, though. Most also don't sit next to me in class or break into my apartment at one in the morning or own a local shop." Urahara was only mildly surprised that she knew he was one. This made him even more curious about what else she knew.

"I figured. So you are aware of what your great-grandfather's, uh, occupation was?" Urahara asked. He got the feeling that if he used the terms shinigami, hollow, gigai, or anything like that she would pretend not to know what he was talking about.

"Yep, he was a policeman of sorts." Claire said. Urahara wasn't sure now if she did know what he was talking about, then he saw her smile and he knew she wasn't planning on admitting what she knew out loud. "By the way, you know Kurosaki Ichigo right?" Urahara nodded. "Is his dad's name Isshin?" Urahara looked surprised that she even knew about Isshin, even his own son didn't know about that.

"Yes, but-" Urahara was interrupted.

"Don't worry, I won't tell them anything as long as you don't speak a word to them either." Urahara nodded. He wondered why she was hiding this from them but he was sure she had her reasons. Claire looked around for a bit. "Where's Yoruichi-san? Doesn't she normally hang around here?"

"Who knows where she is. Why do you ask?" Urahara asked. He wondered if she even knew about Yoruichi, but he doubted that considering she couldn't know that Yoruichi was a cat normally when she was in the living world and she had only met her as a cat and she couldn't know she was actually human.

"Because she makes a really cute cat." Claire said and left with her pocky. Only after she left did Urahara realize that Claire had said 'makes a really cute cat' not 'is a really cute cat'. Claire knew and Urahara got the feeling that he knew who Hitsugaya had heard release their zanpakto.

_A/N: Well here is the fourth chapter. Originally the chapter was going to be Kurosaki Clinic, but I felt that that would be rushing her introduction to other characters. Also, I'm sorry that Hitsugaya was kind of OOC but I needed him to be like that to emphasize to things: one is Claire's 'way with words' and two is I needed someone to lose to Claire and Hitsugaya was the easiest to insult and set up for a fight with her. So I'm sorry about him being OOC. Also I know there are more than just four or five of you reading this, so even if you are just saying I suck please review with a reason why I suck. I know there are a bunch of you reading this so it would be nice if when you read you also reviewed. I really want for Emily to show up soon so I'm going to do more time jumps. Well here are the footnotes:_

(1) Claire is really good at angering even the most calm and levelheaded people. This 'way with words' helps her distract people a lot of times.

(2) Soshi Zassou is supposed to end up meaning 'element weed'. Soshi- element Zassou- weed.

(3) Even though Claire's seal normally completely suppresses her reiatsu, after she pulls some out to use it, it takes a while to seal the reiatsu away again. This is why the reiatsu was unfamiliar to Hitsugaya because he had never been near her when she had just used some reiatsu. The fact that Claire can even use reiatsu is why Yoruichi said that the seals were poorly done.


	5. Observing The Enemy

**The American Student**

_A/N: Well now I'm back in writing mode (sort of) and I've got some great ideas on how to get Emily to Japan because she will have a semi-important role in this fic. Also the introduction for her is going to be amusing (at least to me it seems funny). Well Emily should show up soon. Well I can't think of anything else to say so… On with the story_.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

See chapters one and two for font key.

Chapter Five: Observing the Enemy

It was Monday again and Claire had just gotten out the door. She walked to school like she always did and sat in her desk like she always did. In Claire's mind, Mondays sucked. They were to dull and boring. The only thing to cheer up her mood was that she could still pick on Hitsugaya and the thought of how the other shinigami would react when Claire didn't leave her body when Hitsugaya tried to push her out. There was no proof that she was a shinigami and she liked it that way. Claire had left them in an infinite puzzle where none of the pieces seemed to fit together. Her necklace, eyes, and head ache said one thing; her reaction to Hitsugaya's empty gigai, the glove, and how she was able to hold up a convincing argument when she called Hitsugaya nuts said another. As long as nobody said anything to one of them she was probably safe. Her phone went off; she had a text message.

**_Emily: Claire-chan!!! We've got the arrangements made! I only have to participate in English class there! We just need to finalize the date and I'll be set! I'll leave the date as a surprise for you. See you eventually!_**

Claire was a little afraid of how Emily would make her appearance but she figured, no she hoped, that Emily wouldn't do anything stupid. She texted her back: _**Okay, just don't give me a heart attack when you come. See you soon! **_Hitsugaya had just sat down next to her. He didn't say anything for a while. When Rukia sat down neither did she. Only when Ichigo sat down was the silence broken.

"Toshiro, I heard from Rukia. Is it true the glove didn't work?" Ichigo said. Claire already knew he was a shinigami but she still had to pretend that this was the first she'd heard of it.

"God, not you too! How many nut jobs are there in this class?" Claire said to Ichigo. Ichigo didn't know how to react for a moment and then Hitsugaya relieved his confusion.

"She thinks we're crazy."

"Why? I thought you said…" Ichigo trailed off a bit.

"I know but she insists we're crazy."

"Well what am I supposed to think? You broke into my apartment at one in the morning and started spewing nonsense! And what am I supposed to think of you? You hang out with a pretty boy, a red head with tattoos all over him, and a bald guy who carries a wooden sword with him all the time; If you ask me I think you've all been exposed to paint fumes or something." Claire said as she admired the affect of her words. Ichigo's scowl grew even more furious, Hitsugaya had a really annoyed face on, and Rukia seemed like she was having a hard time keeping her polite act on.

"Do you have a problem with me carrying a wooden sword?" Ikkaku said as he marched over to her desk.

"Not really. I like swords, sword fights, and collecting Asian styled swords. I just find it odd that you're carrying one to school. Of course, I would be tempted to also if I had been allowed to bring any of my swords with me to Japan." It was one hundred percent true. Her bedroom at home had swords lining the walls and Claire had enjoyed having sword fights with her great-grandpa. "Notice how I said tempted to, not actually bringing one. I have enough self restraint to not actually bring one, unlike you." Of course she had to tick him off some way. The more they were focusing on what they were angry about, the less they focused on her. On the other hand, there were some people who you needed to complement to distract them.

"Was I the one who you referred to as pretty boy?" Yumichika said.

"Yep." Claire answered simply.

"You think I'm pretty?" Yumichika said with hope in his voice.

"I think you are very pretty." Claire said. Within moments he walked off, extremely cheerful and distracted. Yumichika was the only one who she truly thought was crazy.

Class started and got to lunch pretty quickly. Claire sat on the roof and hoped she could just sit alone. She wasn't in the mood for picking on Hitsugaya at the moment and she wasn't in the mood for anything besides eating her sushi, actually. Before she could eat anything though Rukia came over and offered Claire some candy. It kind of looked like a green Yogo but she knew what it was. It was something that she had been shown once, a small candy-type thing that will force your soul out of your body and put in a temporary replacement soul. But with her the candy didn't work because of the seal. Claire accepted the candy and ate it; it tasted horrible but it proved that they had no remaining ways of forcing her out of her body. Rukia was confused but left with a smile.

"What the hell is with her? Even if she was just a normal person she would still have been torn out of her body." Renji said. Every one else seemed just as confused as he was.

"The fact that this is happening means that something isn't right. She's not normal." Hitsugaya said. Everyone nodded.

"Well I think that's more than obvious. Her eyes scream different." Ichigo pointed out.

"The only proof we really have is that necklace, her eyes, and the fact that her soul seems glued to her body." Rukia said.

"There is something else I need to tell you guys." Hitsugaya said.

"What?" Matsumoto said.

"I heard someone release their zanpakto yesterday." Hitsugaya began.

"What's odd about that?" Ikkaku asked.

"It wasn't one of you guys. The command and name of the zanpakto were unfamiliar to me. I had someone from twelfth squad check the zanpakto database, what I heard was someone release an unregistered zanpakto. The only other unregistered sword is Ichigo's because he's not an official shinigami."

"So there is an unregistered shinigami wondering around here?" Yumichika asked.

Hitsugaya nodded, "Any guesses who? I've got one."

"Claire? No way. If she can't get out of her body how could she release a zanpakto?" Matsumoto pointed out.

The rest of their lunch consisted of figuring out what Claire was hiding. They didn't get anywhere. They ended up with more questions and no answers. They didn't think they'd be getting anywhere anytime soon. And by the look on their faces Claire knew what they'd been doing during lunch and their results.

"Confusion and sheer annoyance; my work here is done." Claire said quietly to herself as she sat down. They began class again. And the rest of the day passed very slowly. Mondays sucked.

After the bell rang Claire gathered her things and left. She had decided to get online when she got home and check her e-mail (although almost everyone just texted her instead). Soon she found herself on an empty street. It was peaceful until she felt the hollow's appearance. She immediately ran towards it. _Oh shit, _Claire thought frantically, _Menos Grande! _Her panic was only relieved when she felt the presence of seven shinigami. Then she panicked when she realized that there was a second Menos. She could defeat Menos Grandes pretty quick but she wasn't close by and they could destroy things fast. Claire had a new idea; she should go observe the shinigami. She could easily hide so she headed for the park's clearing where the Menos were.

Upon arrival Claire hid in a tree where she could see but not be seen. Three of them were attacking one and four were attacking the other. Claire noticed that when Hitsugaya released his zanpakto the sky darkened and it got cold. She watched them fight. When they finished Claire realized she should have an excuse not to look at them if they noticed her. She pulled out her pocky and cell phone. She pretended to text and to her great misfortune, they noticed her.

"Hey isn't that Bard-san up there?" Rukia asked as she looked up into the tree. The others stopped and looked.

"What's she doing up there?" Ikkaku wondered out loud.

"Eating pocky and texting, probably. She texts during class all the time and she keeps going to the Urahara Shoten for more pocky." Hitsugaya said. To prove his point he jumped into the tree and knocked over the bock of pocky, sending it to the ground. Claire pretended not to know what made her pocky fall over. She leaped down from the tree and picked up the fallen box.

"That's strange, there wasn't a breeze." Claire said to no one in particular. She walked off right between Matsumoto and Rukia, making her eyes get the look that made it seem as if she wasn't seeing them but seeing through them.

"Taicho, I don't think she can see us." Matsumoto said.

"You actually might be right. But it doesn't make sense. I will find out what's going on." Hitsugaya said and the shinigami went their separate ways.

Claire was home and thoroughly proud of her skills as an actress. Now they had absolutely no proof. She heard a light thud on her roof and she felt the reiatsu; Hitsugaya was there. Claire decided to be mean and disrupt his peace. Claire walked out her door and soon she was on the roof.

"I figured this was how you saw me leave the house Wednesday. What are you doing on the roof of my apartment?" Claire asked Hitsugaya.

"Looking at the sky." Hitsugaya lied. Actually the view was nice but he was keeping a watch on Claire.

"And you can't do that anywhere besides my roof…?" Claire didn't believe him one bit. She knew he was trying to keep tabs on her.

"I rather do it on your roof." Hitsugaya answered.

"Why…?"

"Because your roof has a good view." Hitsugaya could tell that Claire didn't really believe him.

"Uh-huh… Sure." Claire said. Claire headed for the edge to jump down. "You know, I'm pretty surprised you got up here." Claire said. She was setting up for another insult.

"Why?" Hitsugaya asked.

"I figured you'd be too short to get up here." Claire said as she dropped down from the roof and went inside before Hitsugaya could say anything. Claire walked over to her computer. There was an e-mail from her mom, dad, and Hana (her little sis who her great-grandpa had insisted be given a Japanese name for some reason). They asked her the typical stuff; how was she doing, did she like Japan, etc… Her mom and dad didn't know about Claire's ability to see ghosts because from when Claire could drink from a bottle she was raised mostly at her great-grandpa's house. Her great-grandpa had felt her reiatsu from her birth and he wanted to make sure she could control it. She was raised from when she was six (the time her great-grandpa died) up to now. Hana knew only because Hana could see normal souls and hollows, but she had not inherited anything more. Claire was only two years older than Hana and so Hana had learned from their great-grandpa not to tell anyone but Claire and Emily that she could see ghosts. Later she told Callie as well but that was after their great-grandpa died. Hana was basically normal in appearance; she didn't have any weird reiatsu affected features. Otherwise she looked a lot like Claire except for her eyes and height. Hana had the most beautiful emerald green eyes. She was very petit and probably going to only be five feet three inches when she was full-grown.

A few days later, Friday to be exact, Claire was once again leaving school when her phone rang the ring tone that signified that she was getting a call from Hana. The ring tone was Hana's favorite song: the chorus of Avril Lavigne's song Girlfriend… in Japanese (her sister had an odd sense of music in Claire's opinion). Claire flipped open the phone.

_"Hi, Hana. What's up?" _Claire asked.

-_"Nothing much. I just wanted to remind you to get me a souvenir while you were in Japan."_-Claire laughed. It was so much like Hana to call for something like this.

_"Will do. Is that all you called for?" _Claire asked.

-_"Yep. Bye."_-

_"Bye." _Claire said and she hung up. She continued to head towards the bookstore she decided to go to today. Ten minutes later she was lost. To her luck she once again ran into Rukia and Ichigo to ask for directions. They gave them to her and she walked off.

"I'm still not sure what to think of her." Ichigo said as they watched Claire as she ran off.

"Same here, it's a little easier to imagine her killing hollows, though, after we saw her easily flip Hitsugaya. But if you just look at her she doesn't seem to fit the part, if you know what I mean." Rukia said. Ichigo and Rukia walked off towards the Urahara Shoten, she had been there enough times that Urahara had to have some information on her or noticed something.

When they arrived at Urahara's place they walked in. Urahara was sitting in the middle of the room. He looked up at them.

"I assume you have come to ask about Bard-san." Urahara said.

"Yeah. Hitsugaya-taicho told us everything that you told him. Have you noticed anything else?" Rukia asked.

"I'm afraid not. I know only what you know." Urahara lied. He couldn't tell them what he knew. If he did that then Claire would tell them about Ichigo's dad, which would cause problems. Also he was sure she had reasons for hiding and he could understand that it would cause problems for her if they found out and he had no intention of being the cause of a few of those problems.

Rukia and Ichigo left. Soon they were walking down a street and saw something that shocked them. Claire was dragging herself down the street, her leg had been badly cut by something and it was covered in her own blood. She could still walk but her left leg was dragging as she moved it. They guessed it had been from a hollow if she was lying to them.

"Bard-san!" Rukia yelled as she ran up to help Claire. Rukia was about to touch Claire's left shoulder about where the seal was when Claire swatted her hand away. She looked at Rukia; her eyes were that same vibrant red that they were when Hitsugaya had raised his reiatsu to see if it would increase her head ache. She was clearly in a lot of pain. "Bard…san…" Rukia said. Claire was silent before she spoke.

"If you are going to put a hand on me I rather you'd not. I can take care of myself." Claire's tone of voice was cold, completely unlike her usual neutral tone. "I'll be fine. I just fell out of a tree and a branch caught my leg. My injury doesn't concern you." Ichigo didn't like her answer one bit.

"What's your problem? She was only trying to help you. Now come on, you're coming to the Urahara Shoten with us. He should have the stuff to fix your leg." He reached for her arm and Claire swatted it away. She had the look in her eye that said 'back off', the kind of eyes a killer might have almost. Her eyes bothered Ichigo a bit.

"I told you it doesn't concern you. I can treat my leg myself." Claire's tone seemed to be getting colder by the minute. She didn't like it when other people tried to take care of her, it made Claire feel to dependant on others and that was a feeling she didn't like. It was also a really bad idea to bother her while she was still in the mindset for battle.

"You're coming." Was all Ichigo said as he and Rukia each grabbed her. Claire responded by elbowing Rukia in the chest and kicking Ichigo where it hurts. She ran as fast as she could towards her apartment. This was why it was bad to bother her while she was still in the mindset for battle, even if it was two on one she'd most likely win. It was hard for her to run and she didn't make it far. Ichigo had caught up and grabbed her.

"Let me go, damn it! Or I'll kick you again." Ichigo didn't let go and instead had Rukia grab her legs. They hauled her off back to the Urahara Shoten. Urahara was still just sitting there in the middle of the room when they got there. He saw how they were holding Claire and then he saw the blood that covered her leg. She was still every so often yelling for them to put her down.

"Uh, Urahara-san. Could you treat Bard-san's leg?" Ichigo asked.

"I told you already, I can take care of myself!" Claire said in the still somewhat cold tone that now had a hint of anger in it. One eye was the vibrant red of pain and the other eye was the deep blood red of anger.

"It seems she rather not be taken care of." Urahara observed. "But I can if she'll sit still." Ichigo and Rukia loosened their grips a bit. In that instant Claire kicked the side of Rukia's neck with her good leg and freed a hand to punch Ichigo in the face. They both let go and Rukia was out cold. Urahara had gotten up without Claire noticing and hit her on the back of the neck hard with his cane, knocking her out.

When Claire awoke she found Urahara, Ichigo, and Rukia sitting in front of her. Her leg was bandage and her neck hurt a lot.

"You didn't need to knock me out cold." Claire said in her normal tone of voice as she sat up and rubbed the back of her neck.

"There was no other way we were going to get you to sit still." Ichigo said.

"Because I didn't want to be helped. I can take care of myself." Claire saw the bruise on Rukia's neck and the one on Ichigo's forehead. "Um… sorry about knocking you out cold, Kuchiki-san. I only meant for you to drop me. Kurosaki-kun, sorry for the huge bruise you got from me. Just don't try and help next time."

"Why not? Why were you so determined to take care of your self?" Rukia asked.

"I have my reasons." Claire said. Mainly she didn't want them to help her because once she got home she could have just used kidou. Another thing was that Rukia and Ichigo were shinigami. She could take care of her self. Claire stood up and grabbed her bag. She headed for the door but Urahara stopped her by tripping her with his cane.

"Stay a bit longer and let your wound have more time to heal without being disturbed." Urahara's voice had completely changed from how Claire was use to hearing it, it was now a deeper tone and much more serious sounding. Completely unlike the sing-songish tone she was used to. The way he said those words made them sound like a command, not an optional offer. Claire looked at him and his face was also more serious looking, but Claire wasn't intimidated. She stood back up.

"I'm leaving. I can take care of my wound at home." Claire said, her voice had turned cold again.

"Stay. That is what is better for your wound." Urahara said in that same serious tone he had only just used moments ago.

"What's better for me is to be alone." Claire said and she left. _She's just like William, _Urahara thought as he heaved a sigh, _even the way she's determined to take care of herself is the same. _Rukia and Ichigo also left.

Three weeks later it was October. Claire was sitting at her desk while the class was learning English. She wasn't paying much attention; she spoke English already so she saw no need to learn it again. It was Friday and even though it was October the windows were open to let in a nice crisp breeze. Then the most unexpected thing happened.

_"Claire-chan! Are you up there Claire?" _Claire darted out of her seat and looked out the window. The person's yelling had caught the whole class's attention. Claire looked and saw what the person was waving in their hands: a shinigami's shoe. She would have recognized it anywhere. There was only one person who would be able to steal a shinigami's shoe and then be dumb enough to wave it in their hands for a class that they knew had shinigami in it to see. There was only one person who was loud enough to yell from the streets and still be clearly heard from a second story classroom. And there was only one person that would show up at her school doing both of these things at once.

Claire yelled in her fastest English possible so that only the person below would understand her. _"Emily! Put the damn shoe away!"_

_A/N: So how did you like it? I thought that this was a good way to bring Emily into the story. Now don't get me wrong, Emily is really smart and clever, she just has no common sense and that's why she's dumb. Well I hoped you liked this chapter. I'm begging you who read this to review. Well I think I did well enough and let me tell you Emily is an, uh, interesting person._


	6. Emily Lund

**The American Student**

_A/N: God, I'm so happy! I have a box of pocky next to my computer, a new Bleach shirt on my bed, and reviews for my fic in my inbox. I'm in a mood for writing. Well I appreciate all the reviews. Now on with the story!_

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

Look at chapter two for the info on different text.

Chapter Six: Emily Lund

Claire wanted to bang her head on her desk, hard on her desk. This qualified as an almost-heart attack. She did wonder how Emily had gotten the shoe, though. Claire looked down to see that Emily had heard her and had put the shoe in her green messenger bag.

_"Claire, where do I go now? I'm supposed to start today." _Emily asked from below.

_"You are supposed to go to the principal's office. It's just inside. Hold on, I'll see if I can be down there in a minute." _Claire yelled down. She then turned to Ochi-sensei. "Um… that's my friend down there. She says she's supposed to start today. Can I go down there?"

"Is it Lund Emily?"

"Yeah. So can I?"

"Sure." Ochi-sensei said. Claire headed for the door and went down to greet Emily. From above Ichigo was watching them from above as Claire ran outside and hugged Emily then hit her over the head and began to yell at her.

_"What were you thinking? I told you there were seven in my class and even more than that who could see it!" _Claire yelled at Emily.

_"I wasn't sure if you could tell it was me from up there. I figured the shoe would give it away." _Emily replied.

_"What ever. How did you get the shoe anyhow?"_

_"One of them was outside sleeping on a bench. By the time he woke up I was probably already on my flight to here."_

_"I can't believe you actually stole one of the shinigami's shoes. Which one was it?"_

_"That really fat one with the buzz cut."_

_"Figures." _Claire said as she grabbed Emily's hand and led her inside. Ichigo looked back to Ochi-sensei who was now asking the class to translate Emily and Claire's conversation that had happened from the window. They couldn't understand what Claire had shouted so they gave up on that.

A few minutes Claire opened the door and stepped through with another girl with stunning orange eyes (they were colored contacts) and shaggy light brown hair tied back in a ponytail so only the front parts held loose and framed her tan face that was decorated by a few freckles across the nose and cheeks. Her hair came down to about one or two inches below her chin and what hung loose had the last two inches died an electric blue color. She was about five feet, six inches. She was already wearing their school's uniform. She had a very boyish figure like Claire and was also thin and muscular. She had a button on her lime green bag that Ichigo's group wouldn't be surprised if it was true. It read 'I see dead people'.

"Uh… Class, I forgot to tell you. Bard-san's friend is joining our class for a while. She won't be doing much of our work because she will still be getting some of her homework e-mailed to her from America." Ochi-sensei said. "Would you please introduce yourself?" Emily stepped forward and smiled. They saw that Emily had decided not to wear white socks. Instead she wore bright blue socks and tennis shoes. They saw that her ears were pierced and she wore the same symbol as Claire's necklace for stud earrings.

"Hi. I'm Lund Emily. I will be in your class for as long as I feel like it and the only reason I'm here is because Claire is here. Nice to meet you." Emily said all of this with a smile as if she dared anyone to comment on her appearance or her words. Her English had vanished and was replaced with Japanese as good as Claire's.

"Is that your real eye color?" Tatsuki asked. She had seen Claire's weird eyes and was beginning to wonder if there was something in the environment where Claire and Emily came from that did things to their eyes. Emily shook her head.

"No. These are colored contacts. I also have a pair that is purple, another one that is cat eyes, and one that is blood red. This is my real eye color." Emily removed the contact in her left eye to reveal teal eyes that rivaled Hitsugaya's in color. After turning her head a bit so every one could get a look she put the contact back in. "I had them specially made since they didn't have what I wanted. I actually don't need glasses but I like changing my eye color."

"Why aren't you wearing the proper shoes and socks?" Ichigo asked. He wondered about this girl. She was a bit odd from what he could tell and he really did wonder about what she decided to put on her feet.

"For one thing blue is twenty times better than white. As for my shoes, tennis shoes are easier to kick people with and I can run faster in them." Emily said. Ichigo wasn't sure if she was serious about her shoes or not. No one could tell if she was kidding, actually. Honestly, she wasn't. Ochi-sensei looked unsure as to what to make of Emily but she spoke anyhow.

"Alright. Well you can take the seat to Bard-san's left, Lund-san. And please at least wear the right shoes tomorrow." Emily nodded and walked over to the left of where Claire had already taken her seat. They continued their morning lessons and soon everyone was getting their stuff for lunch.

_"So, I think I figured out the seven you were talking about. Their energy is kind of like yours a bit so I guessed." _Emily said as she and Claire headed for the roof.

_"So you know which ones to play dumb around? Including more than those seven?" _Claire asked and Emily nodded. _"Good. Now let's just hope none of them saw that shoe and recognized it. Keep your reiatsu concealed and just hope they don't figure anything out." _

_"Will do." _Emily said and they took a seat in the corner of the roof. They talked animatedly to each other about what had been going on in America and Japan. They each had a box of pocky in their hands and were taking bites in between words. Soon Hitsugaya, Matsumoto, and an angry Renji sat down in front of them. Emily gave Claire a look that said 'what's going on' and all Claire could to was give her a look that hopefully said 'just play along'. Emily nodded.

"Hello midget. Hi Abarai-kun, Rangiku-san." Claire said casually.

"Will you not call me midget?!? You know my name!" Hitsugaya said angrily. Emily caught on as to what Claire had been doing.

"Well I don't so you have no reason for telling me that I can't call you midget, midget." Emily said as she opened her pack of sushi. Hitsugaya glared at Emily. She was just like Claire. "Why are you here anyhow? Shouldn't you still be in elementary school?" Claire had taught Emily the fine art of insults for the purpose of distracting people. Hitsugaya's face turned red with anger.

"I'm older than you are and you call me an elementary student?" Hitsugaya said angrily.

"Yep. Why wouldn't I?" Emily said as she plopped a piece of sushi into her mouth. Hitsugaya didn't say anything and threw a chopstick at Emily, who quickly grabbed the chopstick and threw it to the side. "Oh, how mature." Emily said as she resumed to eat. Claire had to restrain herself from laughing. They continued conversation, mostly about Emily and every time she answered them she made them question her sanity even more.

"And she calls me crazy? Her friend is just plain nuts!" Hitsugaya said to Matsumoto as they headed back to the classroom at the end of lunch. Emily had only just minutes ago informed them that she thought the smell of blood would make a wonderful candle scent and the candle company that did it would make millions. She also had stated that it might be fun to take over the world and to do so she would gather an army of midgets and had wondered if Hitsugaya wanted to be the first to join her army (after that comment Hitsugaya had lost his other chopstick).

Everyone had taken their seats and next to Hitsugaya, Emily and Claire were still talking to each other but had resumed using English to make it more difficult on people listening in to understand them. When the teacher came in everyone went quiet except a few who then took a blow to the head from pieces of chalk that had been thrown by Ochi-sensei. Class resumed and the rest of class passed fairly quickly. When the bell rang people began to talk again.

_"Hey, Emily. You are staying at my place, right?" _Claire asked as they headed for the door.

_"Yep. Anywhere you want to go before we head to your place? Like go buy more pocky?" _Emily asked and Claire nodded. They left the school and began to walk in the direction of the Urahara Shoten. Claire explained that Urahara was _the _Urahara Kisuke and she basically explained about Yoruichi and that Ichigo was Isshin's son. Emily understood who they were because she had known since as far back as she could remember. Claire also informed her that Urahara knew about Claire but she hadn't outright admitted it so Emily shouldn't answer him outright either if he asks her anything.

They soon arrived at the Urahara Shoten. Jinta and Ururu were sweeping, as they always seemed to be when Claire came by. When they walked up to the door Jinta gave Emily a weird look but she didn't seem to notice. Just to freak him out though Emily flared her reiatsu twice and then returned to concealing it. Emily checked his reaction and Jinta seemed confused and surprised. When they stepped in Urahara was standing near the register and seemed to have felt Emily's reiatsu as well.

"Was that-" Urahara was interrupted.

"Was that what?" Emily said with a completely innocent voice but a mischievous smile and look in her eyes. Urahara looked from Emily to Claire and then back to Emily. He seemed to understand who had flared their reiatsu.

"Is she-" Urahara was interrupted again.

"No. She simply got side-affects from exposure to me." Claire said as she grabbed Emily's hand and dragged her to where the pocky was. Emily squealed as she saw the selection of pocky. She then ran over to Urahara and unexpectedly hugged him.

"YOU HAVE POCKY!!!" Emily squealed happily. Urahara was shocked. Claire leaped up and pulled Emily off of him. She whacked Emily on the back of the head.

"Sorry. She loves pocky and it's hard to come by in America." Claire explained to Urahara as Emily went back to choosing from all the pocky.

"Uh-huh." Urahara said as he regained his composure. He wasn't sure what to make of Emily. She seemed like an overactive child to him but when she walked in she was completely calm. He wasn't sure what to make of her.

A few minutes later Claire and Emily walked up to the register with eight boxes of pocky. They paid for them and were about to leave when Emily stopped.

"By the way, I'm Lund Emily. I'm Claire's friend from America. You'll be seeing a lot mo-" Emily stopped mid sentence. She looked to Claire.

_"I don't think they're there yet so let's go. If they come by then get in a tree or run as soon as you feel their reiatsu." _Claire said as they dashed towards the hollow Emily and Claire both felt. They arrived fairly quickly and thankfully it was a weak hollow. Emily said she'd take care of it. She focused for a moment and within seconds both arms had a cone-shaped thing of condensed spirit energy. One was red and the other was blue. Fire and ice. Emily charged the hollow and gave it one solid blow to the mask. As the hollow dissolved they felt Ichigo and Rukia getting nearer so they just sat down by a tree and pretended to have been talking just sitting there for more than just the one minute they were. Ichigo and Rukia saw them and then passed. When they had gotten far enough away Claire and Emily got up and headed home.

When they arrived at Claire's apartment they sat down in front of the TV and turned it on. They found some anime was on and watched that. They ate their pocky and talked. They both had a feeling that Japan was going to be a lot more fun now that there were the two of them together.

_A/N: Sorry it was a bit sucky but I think I might have gotten a bug or something from esnips. I really want to know what you think so please review. I hope this was just my computer being stupid because my computer already has some issues but it hadn't done what it did today before. I'm really hoping this isn't a virus or something that tracks what I type because I don't care to have my passwords stolen and I already used two of them after the first thing happened. I do have virus protection (I think) but I hope this was just a one-time thing. If this happens again I might have to stop for a while and ask my dad to run a virus check. Please all of you hope for me not to have a virus because if I do I'm pretty screwed._


	7. Kurosaki Clinic

**The American Student**

_A/N: Well those of you who accept PMs should have gotten the message by now that my normal computer crashed and so I'm forced to use the computer in the family room which I hate but at least it works. Hopefully my computer can be revived. Well thanks for those who keep reviewing over and over. Well on with the story. Here's chapter seven._

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

Look at chapter two for info on different texts.

Chapter Seven: Kurosaki Clinic

It was saturday morning and Emily and Claire were just leaving Claire's apartment. when they had gotten back last night they had found that Nakamoto-san had let himself in and had put all of Emily's stuff in a huge pile in Claire's bedroom. Emily slept on the floor, she actually preferred hard surfaces for sleeping. As Claire locked the door Emily began to nodd off again; Emily was a night owl and was always then still sleepy in the morning, she was never grumpy, just sleepy. Today Emily had put her cat eye contacts in and was getting a weird look from Tatsuki who was waiting at the bottom of the stairs for Orihime. Emily was actually wearing the right shoes for school but she had neon green socks on that went well with her messenger bag that had a second button on today. It read 'why be sane when insanity is much more fun?'.

"Morning, you're in my class right?" Emily asked as she yawned. Tatsuki nodded.

"Yeah. My name is Arisawa Tatsuki." Tatsuki said. Emily nodded and kept walking with claire behind her who also said good morning to Tatsuki. Claire led the way to school and when they got inside they took their seats and Emily immeadiately layed her head down on her desk and fell asleep. Claire just sat there for a while. She was used to Emily falling asleep in the mornings at school. Claire or Callie would always wake Emily up when the teacher came in so she wouldn't get in trouble.

"Is she okay?" Ichigo asked when he and Rukia came over to their seats. Ichigo was looking at the sleeping Emily sitting in the desk behind his desk.

"Yeah, she's fine. She's always like this in the mornings." Claire said as she checked her phone for any new texts; there weren't any. She closed her phone and slid it into her bag that was actually the same style as Emily's, it was khaki instead of green though. More people began to come in and soon Hitsugaya was sitting down next to Claire. when the teacher came in Claire woke Emily who seemed to have gotten a good short nap. As she woke she muttered something that sounded like _'I don't want to eat it...'_. Claire didn't ask.

Soon it was lunch again and Claire and Emily were on the roof eating their pocky and whatever else they had packed for lunch. They were talking about what they would do when school was over for the day. They guessed they would head to the park and climb trees or something.Hitsugaya seemed to have been able to convince no one to come with him to sit with Emily and Claire so he didn't come (Renji and Matsumoto told everyone else about what Emily had said and they didn't dare come to close). It didn't matter though because Claire and Emily soon found themselves being dragged away by Orihime and Chizuru to go sit on the lawn with a group of other girls.

"We retrieved them!" Orihime said triumphantly. Now sitting on the lawn was Emily, Claire, Mahana, Michiru, Chizuru, Ryo, Tatsuki, Orihime, and Rukia (who had been captured in a similar fashion as Claire and Emily only a few minutes before them.). Chizuru leaped at Orihime.

"My Hime-chan is so adorable!" Chizuru said but before she could hug Orihime Tatsuki kicked her down.

"Um... Why were we dragged here?" Emily asked as she checked to make sure her pocky was safe.

"We felt like it. Besides, you two looked lonely sitting there just the two of you." Chizuru said. Emily looked to Claire.

"Were you lonely? I sure wasn't." Emily said.

"Nope not a bit." Claire said as she ate more pocky.

"Also you're both kind of my type." Chizuru said. Emily and Claire exchanged glances.

"I'm leavin'." Emily said as she and Claire grabbed their lunch and pocky.

"Me too." Claire said. Tatsuki hit Chizuru on the back of the head with her foot.

"Ignore Chizuru. Besides I still need to talk to you." Tatsuki said. Both of them turned around.

"What is it?" Claire asked.

"You still owe me one practice. You said you'd come to one of the girl's karate team's practices." Tatsuki said. "And if you can fight you can come too, Lund."

"Oh, I forgot. Um... when's the next practice?" Claire asked. She had completely forgotten about agreeing to coming to one practice.

"Monday. Come then. It's right after school."

"Okay. Em, are you gonna come too?" Claire asked Emily.

"Sure. You have the keys to your apartment anyhow so I don't have much of a choice." Emily said. the rest of lunch was eaten with constant conversion. Eventually all eyes were set on Claire.

"So what's with you and Hitsugaya-kun, Bard-san?" Mahana asked Claire. Claire didn't understand what Mahana was asking.

"What do you mean? What about me and midget?" Claire asked.

"Well you have eaten lunch with him almost everyday. That's got to mean something." Mahana said. Claire stared at her blankly for a minute. Then both her and Emily burst out laughing.

"Me... and... midget?" Claire said inbetween laughs. "You're joking right? That chibi? Yeah right!" Claire said when she finally stopped laughing. She couldn't believe that someone had interpretted it that way.

"She beat him up! Yep, that's true love alright." Emily said as she regained her composure.

"Beat him up? When?" Rukia asked. She only remembered Claire flipping him.

"The same day as I flipped him. He challenged me to a rematch after school at the Urahara Shoten. I knocked him unconcious. He was so ticked off that he wasn't thinking straight. Anger is as bad as fear in fights; it clouds the mind and dulls the blade. But I'm not sure how well he'd do if he wasn't so angry and both of us were using full power. I think he might have done better." Claire mused out loud.

"You knocked him out cold?!?" Rukia asked surprised. Hitsugaya was a taicho, and yet he was beaten by a living thirteen-year-old girl! She couldn't believe it.

"Yep." Claire answered.

"This is why I want you to join the karate team." Tatsuki pointed out. At that time someone pointed out the time and they all got up and headed inside. they got inside and took their seats. Ochi-sensei then came in. Class resumed and Emily had multiple pieces of chalk thrown at her head for talking. It was a pretty usual day.

When they had left school Claire and Emily headed for the park. They figured they could climb some trees and eat pocky. Soon they found themselves jumping from tree to tree seeing who could move fastest (Claire won). When Emily landed in a near by tree she slipped. She found herself falling fast and Claire saw. She dropped from her own tree and ran to where emily had landed. She hadn't broken anything thankfully but she was cut up all over and bleeding a lot. At that point they decided to go home and Emily and Claire could work on healing her wounds there where nobody could see. They grabbed their bags and headed for the edge of the park but unfortunately they ran ionto someone else who thought otherwise.

"Bard-san, Lund-san! What the hell happened?" Ichigo asked as he and Rukia saw them emerging from the park and walked up to them.

"I slipped and fell out of a tree. I'm fine." Emily answered. She and Claire turned to go back to the apartment when Ichigo grabbed Emily by the collar of her shirt and started dragging her.

"What are you doing?" Claire asked as she tried to loosen Ichigo's grip on Emily.

"My family runs a clinic nearby. We'll treat her there and stop the bleeding."

"What if I don't want to be treated?" Emily said. She hated Ichigo's atitude.

"Do you realize how badly you are bleeding? If we don'tstop it soon you'll pass out." Rukia said. Emily smiled at Claire who took the hint and bit Ichigo's hand which made him let go of Emily. she then took the chance to run but was quickly captured by Ichigo again. Rukia had captured Claire and shoved her red bow tie from her uniform in her mouth. She then kicked Claire hard on the neck to knock her out.

Soon they arrived at the Kurosaki Clinic with a really angry Emily and an unconcious Claire. They dragged the two of them into the clinic area where Isshin was at a counter and appeared to be going through some papers.

"Oy, dad. Can you treat her wounds? She's bleeding a lot." Ichigo said. Isshin looked up from the counter and at the four kids standing there, well two standing and two slung over shoulders.

"I said I didn't want to be healed! Let me and Claire go. I can heal my wounds on my own." Emily protested. The more time Claire was here unconcious the more chances they have of seeing her seal and Emily knew that. She doubted they would let her go untreated so she tried to reason with them. "I'll let myself get treated only if you'll put Claire and me down right now. Put her in a chair or something."

"Sure." Ichigo said as he let her go and Rukia placed Claire in a nearby chair.

"Uh... I can treat her I guess But what happened to you anyhow?" Isshin asked. emily was all scratched up on every inch of her body and some wounds were shallow while others were deep.

"I was tree climbing with Claire and I slipped. Most wounds are from branches and a few are from Kurosaki-kun tackling me. If you ask me if I didn't know what was going on I would have thought it was some creep mugging me. You really should teach your son not to tackle his classmates." Emily said. She knew that this man was Kurosaki Isshin because Ichigo had called him dad.

"Classmate? You and that girl there are his classmates?" Isshin asked. The girls were both tall but they looked a few years younger that Ichigo and Rukia.

"Well I managed to get them to let me in but I only have to do the English work. Claire is the only one who is actually officially in their class. I just managed to make them let me come and be with Claire. It was a pain in the but though to get them to let another thirteen-year-old American girl go to Japan as a tenth grader." Emily said.

"So you are younger." Isshin said in an almost questioning way.

"Yes. So can I just get treated so I can get out of here with Claire?" Emily asked. Isshin nodded. He led her to a room a bit further in with a couple rows of white hospital beds. Emily sat down on a bed and waited for him to tend to her wounds.

About fifteen minutes later when she had had about half her wounds treated she heard a loud thud and some yelling. Then another minute later Claire walked in to the room smiling.

_"I don't even want to know what just happened." _Emily said as Claire sat down next to her.

_"Revenge. You'll see." _Was all Claire said. Isshin looked from Claire to Emily. He didn't know what either of them had said but he'd heard the yelling in the other room.

"What the hell was that for?!?" Ichigo asked as he and Rukia came into the room.

"What happened?" Isshin asked.

"When Bard-san woke up she attacked us!" Ichigo said.

"You lost to a girl who is two years younger than you?" Isshin began to laugh. "You still have much to learn my son."

"What it was for was tackling and then knocking me out cold. It was also for tackling Emily."

"But, Bard-san, I don't think kicking me in the gut was neccesary." Rukia said as she did her best to keep using her fake voice.

"Neither was shoving your bow tie in my mouth." Claire responded.

"Your name is Bard?" Isshin asked. He had recognized the name but wondered if it could be a coincidence.

"Yeah. Why?"

"Nothing." Was all he said and he continued to take care of Emily. Emily and Claire both knew that he had recognized the name. Emily decided to tip him off by raising her reiatsu the slightest bit and then masking it again. Isshin noticed and Emily pretended to not notice anything. Claire wanted to smack Emily for doing that because Rukia had noticed as well. Thankfully she hadn't noticed it was Emily.

Soon Emily was almost entirely covered in bandages which she would most likely draw on later with permanent marker. Claire had dozed off and fallen backwards so that she was laying on her side on the bed. Unfortunately it was her left side that was facing up. When Rukia decided to wake Claire up she walked over to her and shook her. It moved er shirt a bit and it revealed her seal just as Claire woke up.

"Th-that mark..." Rukia said dropping her fake voice. She had just seen the tenth division's mark tattooed on a thirteen-year-old girl.

"Oh," Claire made a nervous laugh, "You saw that?"

"Yeah. Where did you get that tattoo?" Rukia asked.

"I'd rather not talk about it." Claire said. She hoped they wouldn't keep asking about her seal. Emily gave her a nervous glance. They both knew that Rukia would tell the others what she saw. Thankfully Emily had just finnished being treated and the two of them left.

_"Why did you have to fall asleep? You know that shorty is going to find out about this."_

_"I know. Hopefully we can convince them that this is just a tattoo and nothing more." _Claire said as they got inside her apartment. They sat down and Emily began to pul out handfulls of colorful markers from her bag. She drew on them a bit then she pealed them off. She held out her right arm and watched as the blue cone of ice-reiatsu appeared and then turned a pale green color. She started holding the cone to her wounds and watched as they healed in mere moments.

When she finally healed all of the wounds she could reach Claire took over and used kidou to heal the rest. It was late and they worked on their homework. When they finished that Claire headed for bed and Emily turned on the TV. Tomorrow would be Sunday, their day off.

On Sunday it was raining so they headed for the mall's bookstore which had an incredible selection of manga. It also had a coffee shop in there so they bought some manga and then went to get some capuccionos. They looked through the clothing stores and spent their whole day exploring the mall. When they got back to the apartment they went through their purchases. Emily was especially proud of her five new pairs of neon colored socks.

The next day they woke up and got ready. Emily stumbled out the door and was so tired that she hadn't even bothered to put contacts in. Claire wondered why Emily was more tired then usual but didn't ask, if she had she probably wouldn't have even gotten an actual word out of Emily. She would have gotten something that resembled 'muhmpfnyuh'. When they got to class Emily immeadiatley slept at her desk; she even snored a bit. The teacher came in early so Emily didn't get much rest but she still looked a little more awake.

"So someone stole your sword?" a voice said from outside the door. Claire looked to see Ichigo come in with Hitsugaya. Emily looked fifty times more awake when she heard this.

"Yeah. I figured it was one of you guys because nobody else should have been able to see it." Hitsugaya said. Claire looked to Emily who was failing miserably at her attempt to hide her smile.

_"You stole his sword?!?" _Claire said in a low voice to Emily. Emily only nodded because if she spoke she knew she would burst out laughing. _"Where did you put it?" _

_"You'll see." _Claire had a horrible feeling about where Emily hid it.

By lunch time Emily still wouldn't reveal where she'd hidden the zanpakto. Claire knew she hid it somewhere that Hitsugaya would find it again, she never stole a zanpakto and kept it. Hitsugaya seemed in an unusually bad mood and the other shinigami, Claire, and Emily knew why. Unfortunately this made him even more stubborn when he asked to see Claire's 'tattoo'.

"No. It's none of your business." Claire answered.

"If you don't show it to me now I'll probably see it during swim class." Hitsugaya said. Claire had forgotten about swimming and just hoped that the suit would cover her seal.

"Well then you'll just have to wait." And that ended their conversation. After lunch ended they still had an hour of lessons before they had swimming.

Soon Claire found herself changing into her suit and then asking Emily if she could see her seal. Emily assured her that you could only see one of the numbers. They walked out to the pool and Emily seemed really cheerful as they stood at the edge of the pool. Claire followed her gaze and saw something metal and shiney laying at the bottom of the pool. When Hitsugaya walked to the edge and looked at the pool his expression was priceless.

_A/N: So how did you like this chapter? I think I did pretty well for someone who was getting thoroughly pissed off at the computer she was using. I managed to write this chapter though and I'm pretty sure I got a virus when I downloaded the japanese version of Girlfriend off of esnips and that's what crashed my hard drive. I'm so glad my mom was a computer progrmmer and my dad is an engeneer for computers, space ships, and airplanes. Also while I'm writing this chapter my city has just experienced a huge thunderstorm that knocked out our cable and internet. We blame this partialy on our neighbors' tree that fell very near our power box and most likely our cable for cable TV. How wonderful that there is more heading our way tonight and tomorrow night. Well I hope to get my internet and computer back very soon._


	8. Swim Class

**The American Student**

A/N: Well while I'm writing this my internet is still dead. I think it's more dead than my computer. Well I''m going to keep writing so I have something to do while it's so freakishly hot and humid outside and our internet and TV don't work inside so I'm left with writing cause I ran out of books and my sister isn't here to borrow manga from right now so I'll keep myself entertained this way. I hope everyone is amused by Emily. I intended her to be odd. My brother has just informed me that our VCR was killed by soemthing that had to do with last night's storm and now we can't use our PS2 which will cause issues for my brother the gaming addict. Well I know I sound like I'm ranting but oh well, on with the story.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach. If I did I would have already bought a new computer by now instead of waiting for my dad to screw with it's hard drive.**

See chapter two for information on texts.

Chapter Eight: Swim Class

As soon as the other shinigami came to the pool they saw what triggered Hitsugaya's current facial expression. There at the bottom of the pool at the deep end was Hyourinmaru. Nobody knew how it got there but currently Hitsugaya didn't care how it had gotten there, he just wanted his zanpakto back. Unfortunately he couldn't just dive in right then and there, then he would get in trouble. No, he had to wait until he was already in the pool at the deep end to retrieve Hyourinmaru. Claire stared at Emily, she had to wonder how Emily had gotten into the school's pool area at night. On the other hand, though, it was also pretty hard to steal a shinigami's zanpakto.

_"I can't believe that __**that's **__what you did with his sword. Nice work." _Claire said. She had to admit, Emily's skills were pretty impressive.

_"Thanks. I thought you'd appreciate my work. It was tricky breaking into the school, I have to admit that. But midget had fallen asleep on the roof and it was just too good to resist. He looks like he's about to explode." _Emily said as she smirked in Hitsugaya's direction. It was so much fun toying with shinigami.

Ten minutes later Claire wondered how she'd ended up with him as her partner. She'd wound up with Yumichika. He kept getting distracted when it was his turn to use the timer and not writing down her times. Then when it was his turn he kept complaining that going into such chlorinated water would harm his beauty. Claire insisted that water wouldn't harm his beauty. Then he'd gone all cheerful and distracted because she'd called him beautiful. He was hopeless. Only after the gym teacher yelled at him did he get in the pool. Even then he swam horribly slow. Finally she decided to motivate him.

"Aesagawa-kun! Swimming that slow makes you look ugly!" That got him moving. He swam faster than anyone else in the pool. When he got out of the pool he looked furoius.

"Did you call me ugly?" Yumichika asked angrily.

"Swimming that slow would make anyone look ugly. But you looked even more beautiful when you swam faster." Yumichika got all giddy again when Claire said that. Claire sighed and got into the pool. She couldn't believe he was so full of himself.

At the other edge of the pool Emily had better luck with her partner, but not much better. Emily had been paired up with Renji. They argued almost nonstop.

"I told you my time couldn't have been that short!" Emily yelled at her red-headed partner.

"Why are you complaining that your time was short?!? Most people complain when their time is long!" Renji yelled back.

"Well I just want it to be right!"

"Who cares?!?"

"I do! Now fix the time!"

"What's there to fix? It's already right!"

"Hand me the clipboard! I'll fix it!"

"Just leave it! Take the damn timer and time me!" Renji yelled back. He handed the timer to Emily who took it.

"Fine. Hurry up and get in!" Emily yelled. Renji jumped into the pool and began to swim.

When Renji got out he then argued that his time couldn't have been that long. On the opposite corner from the fighting pair was Matsumoto and Hitsugaya, who was extremely pleased that he had his zanpakto back. They looked over at Emily and Renji who were loud enough to probably be heard from the locker rooms.

"It's like listening to Ichigo and Renji fighting." Hitsugaya observed.

"Yeah, it is." Matsumoto said as she hoisted herself out of the pool. Ichigo, who was right next to them with Rukia, overheard.

"What is that supposed to mean?" He didn't get his answer because class ended with the sound of the gym teacher's whistle. He barked the intsructions for each pair to turn in their sheets and return to their locker rooms.

In the boys locker room Renji was complaining about Emily and was shut up by Hitsugaya when he told Renji that Emily reminded him alot of Renji. In the girls locker room Claire mentioned how she motivated Yumichika and Emily laughed. Emily hadn't complained much about Renji, it was fun arguing with people. Tatsuki was silently fuming because Chizuru was paired with Orihime. Chizuru then told Claire and Emily that she wanted to pair up with one of them next time. They both just walked away.

Back in the classroom they were once again put into groups. This time it was groups of three. Guess who Claire got put with? If you said two other shinigami you were right. Claire was paired up with Hitsugaya and Rukia. And Ochi-sensei had set up the worst combination possible: Renji, Ichigo, and Emily. They didn't shut up. It was for science and they argued about every single thing, from who was doing what to how to do it. At Claire's table it was eerily quiet. Eventually Rukia broke the silence.

"So did you see Bard-san's tattoo, Hitsugaya-taicho?" Rukia asked.

"No, she wouldn't let me see it." Hitsugaya responded.

"Yeah, because I definately want to show something off that I don't even want to talk about." Claire said sarcastically.

"Why don't you want to talk about it?" Hitsugaya asked.

"Telling you that would qualify as talking about it." Claire said. She honestly didn't want to talk about it. She poured some liquid into another and passed it to Hitsugaya.

"Okay," Hitsugaya said, "How about you tell me what you know about Hyorinmaru being in the pool." Claire figured that he'd guess Claire had something to do with it. She played dumb.

"Hyorin-what?" Claire asked, giving Hitsugaya her best blank stare.

"Hyorinmaru, my zanpakto." Hitsugaya said.

"Zanpakto? And that is...?" Claire asked.

"My sword." Hitsugaya said.

"So you named a sword and threw it in the pool... You really are nuts. And you must be hallucenating because I didn't see a sword in the pool." Claire said. Hitsugaya gave up on the topic and was quiet for the rest of class.

After class Claire and Emily headed towards the small building on campus. It was mostly used for the karate teams but a few other clubs used it on occasion too. The two of them had already changed into knit shorts and T-shirts and Emily had taken out her earings. When the walked in the found a group of girls in white uniforms with Tatsuki in the middle stretching out. Tatsuki looked up at them. She signaled for them to come over and stretch. Emily and Claire took a seat on the floor and stretched out.

"Alright! Girls, I've told you who they are already so don't kill them." Tatsuki said to the karate team members. She then turned to Emily and Claire, "We'll just do some sparring and we'll switch partners around." Tatsuki then instructed who each girl should pair up with.

_"Go easy on them. They aren't shinigami and they most likely can't tolerate as much damage. I don't want any one sent to the hospital." _Claire whispered to Emily as they went to their partners. Claire had been paired up with a girl with dark brown hair and she was about five feet, three inches tall. She was extremely muscular but Claire figured she could take the girl on. When they both had said they were ready Claire let the other girl make the first move. The girl threw a kick at Claire and she easily dodged it; compared to shinigami this was nothing. The girl continued to throw kicks and punches until finally Claire grabbed the girl's leg and pulled as she twisted her wrist making the girls body turn and land on her stomach. After a few moments the girl got back up. Once again she threw a kick at Claire and instead of moving out of the way, Claire threw out her own leg and kicked the girl a little harder than she'd intended to. The girl landed on her side and was coughing as she struggled to get ahold of her breathing. Claire knelt down beside the girl.

"I'm so sorry! Are you okay?" Claire asked as the girl gradually sat up. The girl nodded and continued to cough. Tatsuki had seen what happened and stopped sparring and came over.

"Do you need to sit out a bit? It looked like you got hit pretty bad and if you can't stop coughing you should sit out." Tatsuki said. She then looked at Claire, "Nice kick, but you didn't need to hit her that hard." Claire let out her breath.

"I hadn't intended to hit her that hard, but what's done is done." Claire said. She waited for a few minutes then Tatsuki rearanged the partners. They now had to have one person wait because the had an odd number now. Emily was paired with a short, wimpy looking girl as her second partner. Emily wasn't like Claire, she didn't wait for the enemy to throw the first punch or kick, she just hit them hard until they'd had enough. She'd never actually been taught to fight and she just had good instincts. So when they were both ready Emily immeadiatly punched the girl in the stomach. The girl tried to block but that just resulted in a kick to her side. Emily was like Claire when it came to holding back, she struggled with it. They were both so used to being thrown into battles with hollows and shinigami that it had become difficult to _not_ break some bone in their opponent's body if the opponent wasn't used to heavy damage. The girl moved out of the way and through a punch but Emily grabbed her wrist and flipped her. When the girl stood up again Emily punched her in the stomach. As the girl stumbled back Emily kicked the girl in her side again. The girl tried to kick but Emily grabbed her leg and pulled suddenly, resulting in the girl lying on her back and what appeared to be in an unconcious state. Tatsuki, who'd been the one sitting out, looked from Emily to her opponent and back.

"Well, we have an even number again." Tatsuki said as she picked up the unconcious girl and layed her down on the floor out of the way. Tatsuki waited a minute, not exactley wanting to pair up with Emily right away after what she had just seen. Soon she switched up the partners again. After an hour only Tatsuki, Claire, and Emily were left in any condition to fight. Tatsuki decided to pair up Claire. After the both said they were ready Tatsuki spoke again.

"Don't you dare hold back. I know you and Lund have been this whole time but I don't think I need a handicap."

"Alright, but don't blame me." Claire said. Tatsuki had been watching her fight, she was good. She couldn't let her gaurd down for even a split second. Since Claire obviously wasn't going to make the first move Tatsuki did. She threw a punch and when Claire dodged that she threw a kick right where she was about to be. Claire lokked at Tatsuki and Tatsuki was afraid. Claire was smiling. Claire stoppedbefor she was kicked and threw a kick of her own at Tatsuki's stomach. Tatsuki flew back and hit the wall that was about five feet behind her. It took her a minute to recover from the shock. Her back hurt a lot now but she was determined. She got the feeling Claire could still hit harder than that. Claire's eyes had turned a silvery blue color.

"Sure you don't want me to hold back?" Claire asked. Tatsuki was a bit creeped out a bit by Claire's tone of voice. It was a bit more cruel but yet it still sounded similar to normal. Emily was tempted to stop Claire from fighting. She knew that when Claire had to hold back in fights over and over again she got a bit frustrated. And when someone told her not to hold back when she was like that, well Claire was willing to comply. Emily herself was annoyed with having to fight so many people who didn't have a decent guard. Tatsuki stood up again but didn't say any thing as she walked back over towards Claire. Emily knew that Claire had enough common sense still not to use full strength, if she did Tatsuki would be severely injured. This was Claire's way of just getting rid of some frustration. Tatsuki threw a kick, Claire grabbed it and kneed Tatsuki in the stomach. Tatsuki threw a punch and Claire dodged. Emily was relieved to see that Claire had blown off enough steam and was going a bit easier on Tatsuki.

Soon Tatsuki was in no condition to fight and the only people left standing were Claire and Emily. The karate club members would recover soon and out of them Tatsuki was in the best condition. After she caught her breath she walked over to Claire and Emily.

"So are you going to join?" Tatsuki asked. Claire and Emily looked at her.

"Sorry, but no. Thanks for letting us come to a practice. We're sorry about what happened to your members." Claire said. Her voice no longer had that cruel edge to it. Her and Emily left and headed back to the apartment.

That night Emily awoke in a cold sweat. She'd dreamed about that night again. The blood, that sword. And the pitch black hatred that she felt that raged in the reiatsu she'd felt that night and hoped never to feel reiatsu like that ever again. Just the memory had sent her heart pounding in her chest. She would never forget that night three years ago. And unfortunately she had the feeling that she'd see that sword and feel that reiatsu again, but this time here in Japan.

_A/N: I'm really sorry this took so long but we had more internet problems and I just started another fic, this time for Ouran High School Host Club. Well I won't update as much because of the other fic and because school starts in like a week from monday. Well I really hoped you liked this chapter. So any guesses what Emily was dreaming about? Well please review! Also, if anyone here is good with japanese and is willing to have some of the story spoiled I really could use the help because I'm not sure how I should phrase something. Thanks!_


	9. Red and Black Memory

**The American Student**

_A/N: Well just so all of you know, I'm going to torment you. You most likely won't find out about Emily's dream until the climax of the story. I'm sure that those of you who read carefully might pick up on what was going on in Emily's dream but I think it might be tough. If anyone has a guess at what was going on, leave it in a review or PM. I really want to hear how some of you might interpret the hints. Well anyhow, thanks to those who reviewed! On with the story!_

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

See chapter two for info on fonts/texts.

Chapter Nine: Red and Black Memory

Emily couldn't get much sleep after she'd woken up in the middle of the night. That image haunted her. Emily knew that if she told Claire about it Claire would only remember it as a vague blur of blood and the color black. She might even remember the screams that rang through the night but that was unlikely. Emily could remember how many trees had been killed that night, the number of cuts she'd gotten, everything about that night was as vivid now as it had been then. She knew that that scene would be repeated again, and she had the sinking feeling in her stomach that it would be soon. The image of those eyes were what worried Emily the most, those eyes filled with hatred. But she couldn't tell Claire, besides the fact that she wouldn't remember, that night was even more painful for her.

_"Emily, what cereal do you want for breakfast?" _Claire called from the small kitchen. Emily was in the bedroom changing clothes.

_"Um... whatever you're having." _Emily called back. She put in a pair of blood red contacts and walked into the kitchen where two bowls of cereal were layed out. Emily sat down at the one closest to her. Emily didn't say anything, which was usual in the morning, but Claire could tell Emily had something on her mind.

_"Em-chan, something wrong? You seem like something is wrong with you."_ Claire said as she sat down. Emily just shook her head and yawned. Her eyes were focused on her cereal. Because she'd had that dream again she knew she'd be distracted for most of the day. She tried to stop thinking about it but it was hard not to. Normally Emily had no problem with the sight or smell of blood, she'd been around it for as far back as she could remember and she could no longer remember a time when she didn't come home with a hollow's blood on her arms, but that night there was so much that even now it made her feel sick.

As they walked to school they were silent. Emily was still tired and was starting to forget that she'd dreamed about that night. As they walked into the classroom Emily noticed that the shinigami were already there. Emily and Claire sat down in their seats and Emily immediately dozed off. Claire looked at her friend as she slept. She knew something was wrong with Emily and she wondered what it was. Claire continued to wonder what was wrong until the teacher came in, at which point Claire woke Emily up. Emily seemed to be in a bit better mood after the nap so Claire decided that maybe she was just overly tired.

As the day went on Emily thought less and less about that night and Claire had decided to put Emily's behavior earlier under the category of 'lack of sleep'. After school they headed to the Urahara Shoten for more pocky. And as a joke Emily once again flared her reiatsu to announce their arrival. Urahara greeted them and they immediately went to where the pocky was. They chose from the flavors and paid for it.

"You girls seem to go through pocky fast." Urahara said as Emily handed him the money.

"So what if we do? You make money from us buying pocky so you shouldn't care." Emily said as she and Claire walked out the door. After that they just went home and did their homework as they ate pocky. They joked around a bit but Emily's mind wasn't really there, it was still on her dream.

After Claire had gone to bed Emily went outside and got up on the roof. Hitsugaya was already up there but Emily ignored him. She just lied down on the roof and looked up at the stars. Hitsugaya stared at her, normally she would be harassing him by now but even he noticed that she seemed distracted. She was just staring straight up at the sky and appeared to be in deep thought.

"It's unusual for you just to ignore me." Hitsugaya told Emily.

"How would you know what's usual for me? You've only known me for a couple weeks. For all you know I could be acting normally right now." Emily said in return. Hitsugaya knew she had a point. But how she was acting now was very unlike what he'd come to know as usual for her. Emily was too distracted to notice the look she was getting from Hitsugaya. Her memory was too disturbing for her to care about other things at that moment.

--Flashback--

It was dark and Emily and Claire both reeked of the smell of blood. Emily had Claire slung over her shoulder and they were heading to Claire's great-grandpa's hidden building. It was out in the forest near their city and no one else knew of it's existence. The two girls were covered in blood; they couldn't let their parents see them like that. Emily opened the sliding door and layed Claire down on the wood floor. Emily moved her hands around and found the matches. She moved carefully over to the fireplace and threw in some of the wood left in the small building. It was better not to use the electricity because everything was battery powered and Emily didn't know how many batteries were left in the place. As the fire started she headed outside and by the light of a flashlight she pumped up some water from the well into the old metal bucket lying next to it. They had a shower but you had to poor water into a large container that was hooked up to the showerhead by a hose.

After she'd gotten the majority of blood off of her Emily threw on one of the old robes sitting in a closet, she had her clothes (or what was left of her outfit) sitting in a bucket of water. She walked over to Claire and began to take her clothes off of her so she wouldn't be soaking in blood. She then went outside again quickly to get a bucket of water again. When she came inside she began to wash the blood off of her friend's wounds and body with a wet washcloth. After words she began to heal Claire's wounds and then healed what she could of her own. When that was done she grabbed another robe and a blanket from the closet. She gently put Claire in the robe and then covered her with the blanket. Emily stayed up all that night taking care of the fire, her hands still covered with some blood.

--End Flashback--

Emily vaguely realized that she was wet and someone was shaking her as they called her name.

"Oy, Lund-san. It's raining." Hitsugaya said as he shook Emily who had spaced out as she was absorbed in her memory. Emily sat up and headed for the edge of the roof and got off. Once inside she went into the bathroom and took a shower. She didn't know why but she just got the feeling that it would happen again and that like last time she'd leave the scene covered in blood than wasn't only her own. Once she dried off and brushed her teeth she headed for bed. But tonight her sleep was more peaceful as she forgot about last night's dream.

The next day Emily was back to normal. She and Claire were walking to school; Emily half asleep like usual and Claire making sure Emily didn't fall asleep while standing. The whole day went by as normal; they picked on Hitsugaya and they made sure nobody noticed anything about them. Over all their day was pretty dull. Since Hitsugaya wasn't on the roof they got up there. Then both Claire's and Emily's phones went off signaling a text. They both flipped open their phones to look at the message and on both phones it was the same.

_**Callie: New news. Huge explosion at the park, heard from some souls that it was caused by something that called itself an arrancar. From what I got they said that it appeared to be part hollow and part shinigami with a partial mask. I don't know much else besides that according to the ghost it was much stronger than a normal hollow. Be careful. **_

_"Arrancar? I've never heard of that." _Emily told Claire. Claire nodded.

_"Me neither. But Callie said it was part shinigami and part hollow. Never heard of anything like that." _Claire agreed. They hadn't realized they weren't alone.

"Did you just say shinigami, hollow and arrancar?" Hitsugaya asked as he jumped up onto the roof.

"What are you talking about?" Claire asked, pretending to be really confused. Hitsugaya knew that he'd already lost this argument and just shook his head.

"Never mind." Hitsugaya said. At that the two girls got off the roof to discuss the text message.

_"Damn, that was close. Good thing his English probably isn't great." _Emily said. Claire nodded.

_"Too bad we don't have any other information. If one of these arrancar show up in Japan it could be bad." _Claire figured. She really didn't care to have to battle anything stronger than a Menos.

They spent the rest of their evening doing homework because Emily had just gotten a very large e-mail from her teachers.

_"Emily, hurry up! We're going to be late for school." _Claire yelled as she stood next to the door. Emily stumbled into the room as she finished pulling her hair back. She only had time to put in one contact so she had one blue eye and one cat eye. Emily decided she thought it looked cool. As soon as Emily got her shoes on they were out the door and running towards the school.

_"This is what you get for not checking your e-mail sooner." _Claire told Emily as they walked through the classroom door. Emily just sighed and sat down to try and catch a quick nap. She didn't get to sleep for long, since they had been so late the teacher was in the classroom already and at the sight of the sleeping student she threw a piece of chalk at Emily's head. Emily jolted awake and grabbed the chalk before it hit her. Emily slept soundly enough but she never slept so deep that she couldn't stop any objects headed for her. After all, she had been attacked in her sleep before (by her cat) and had learned to somehow still be aware that she would be hit by something even in her sleep.

"Well I'm glad to see you're awake." Ochi-sensei said to Emily with a slight smirk. A few of the students were staring at Emily in surprise; she had seemed sound asleep yet she was able to not get hit by the chalk. Hitsugaya was also a bit surprised at Emily's display of great reflexes. Emily blushed slightly at the teacher's comment but only for a moment.

After school Emily and Claire were walking back home when Claire stopped. Emily turned around and looked at her friend.

_"What's wrong?" _Emily asked. It was unusual for Claire to just suddenly stop like that.

_"The arrancar thing is bugging me. I want more information." _Claire answered.

_"And where could we get that information without asking one of the shinigami?" _Then something clicked in Claire's mind.

_"That's exactly what we'll do. There's one shinigami that already knows." _Claire stated. Emily caught on to her meaning.

_"Urahara Kisuke." _They both said in unison as they turned in the new direction they were going to head for.

A few blocks away from the Urahara Shoten Emily stopped and Claire turned around.

_"Before you even say it I know that by asking him we will probably have to give him a few answers of our own. But if you haven't forgotten he can't tell the shinigami anything without me finding out and telling them about Kurosaki Isshin. It'll be fine." _Claire reassured her friend. Emily nodded and they continued towards their destination. When they arrived at the Urahara Shoten they walked up into the store as usual but Urahara wasn't in the main room so they turned around to Ururu and Jinta.

"Is Urahara-san here? We need to talk to him." Emily asked the two kids. Jinta looked at them.

"What for?" Jinta asked.

"We need some information that we believe he might have." Claire said.

"What kind of information?" Jinta asked. He wanted know what they would need to know that they would have to ask Urahara. Emily was getting annoyed by the kid's questions. She flared her reiatsu before she spoke.

"Does it matter?" Jinta didn't complain and went through a set of doors leading farther into the building. A few minutes later he came back with Urahara behind him.

"Ah, Bard-san, Lund-san. I heard you have something to ask me." Urahara said in his usual sing song voice.

"In private." Emily said. Urahara nodded and led them through a sliding door into a room with a small round table in the middle. The three of them sat around the table. Urahara was wondering what they needed to ask him in private.

"So what do you need to know?" Urahara asked the two girls.

"What do you know about arrancars?" Claire asked. Urahara's expression became a bit more serious.

"Why do you ask?" He wondered where the two girls had heard about arrancars.

"Can you read English?" Emily asked. Urahara nodded. Emily pulled out her phone and found the message. She handed the phone to Urahara. After reading it he handed the phone back. Bt before he could speak Claire's phone went off and Claire quickly opened it.

_**Hana: Sis, those arrancar things just came back. Two of them this time. From what I can tell they're working for someone they call Aizen-sama. I'm in a tree watching them; they don't appear to be doing anything. Wait, they just left. I just figured you should know that there is more than one. **_

"Here is another question: who is Aizen?" Claire asked. Urahara gave her a questioning look so Claire handed her phone over. After he read it and handed the phone back Claire handed it to Emily to read. Once that was done he explained about the arrancar, Aizen, and that a war would start soon. They asked questions and he answered. About fifteen minutes later he was finished explaining.

"Okay, that's all we needed to know." Claire said as she and Emily stood up to leave.

"Wait a moment, Bard-san. I have a question for you as well." Urahara said. Emily and Claire sat back down and waited. "By any chance, was that you that Hitsugaya-san heard release their zanpakto?" Claire knew he would ask her something.

"The one he couldn't identify? Yeah, unfortunately he was close enough to hear me. He almost saw me too but I got out of there in time." Claire answered.

"One more question, how did you know that I would have answers?" Urahara asked.

"I know that you used to be taicho of the twelfth squad. I also know that Yoruichi-san is the former taicho of the second squad." Claire casually answered. Urahara was surprised, he had had a suspicion that Claire knew Yoruichi wasn't a cat but he wouldn't have thought that she knew their former rankings.

"I see," Urahara said. Claire and Emily once again stood up to leave. They said goodbye and left. Yoruichi, who'd been listening in the whole time, walked into the room.

"So the girl knew all along. I really do wonder how much William taught her. She might be useful in the upcoming war depending on how strong she is…" Yoruichi said. "Her friend might be useful as well…"

Back at Claire's apartment the two girls had pushed the entire conversation with Urahara from their minds and were now discussing more important matters (in Emily's opinion).

_"Arrg! I left my bottle of hair dye at home!"_ Emily fumed. The dye she had in her hair had only been semi-permanent and was now fading.

_"Then go bye a new bottle at one of the nearby stores."_ Claire suggested as she turned the page of her manga.

_"But I liked the brand I had!"_ Emily explained.

_"They might have it at one of the stores." _Claire said in a slightly annoyed tone of voice.

_"But it was an American brand, they won't have it here." _Emily complained in a slightly whiney voice.

_"And you're sure you didn't bring it?" _Claire asked. She loved Emily like a sister, she really did, but sometimes she just wanted to strangle her for things like this.

_"I'm sure. If I had it would have been,"_ Claire could hear Emily rummaging through one of her suit cases, _"right… oh, here it is. Never mind, crisis solved." _Claire wanted to hit her head on the wall behind her. There was a soft clicking sound and Claire knew that Emily was in the bathroom re-dying her hair.

Some time later, probably almost an hour later, Emily finally came out of the bathroom with the dyed parts of her hair as bright as they should be. After Emily put away the almost empty bottle of hair dye she came into the main room and plopped down on the floor next to Claire.

_"What do should we eat for dinner?" _Emily wondered out loud. Claire looked up from her manga. She looked up at the ceiling.

_"Macaroni and cheese like usual?" _Claire said with a slight smirk. She knew what Emily was getting at: she wanted to go out to eat. _"Or I guess we could go find a fast food place." _Emily smiled as Claire got up to go grab her ever-present messenger bag. Emily did the same before putting on her tennis shoes and heading out the door. Claire followed and locked the door behind them.

Half an hour later Emily and Claire were heading back to the apartment. Once inside Emily disappeared. Claire figured she just went to the bathroom or something but she was proved wrong when Emily headed for the front door with a bottle of whip cream and a piece of yarn (Claire wondered where it came from).

_"Do I really want to know?" _Claire asked from her place on the floor with a pile of manga next to her. Emily had a huge grin and shook her head before opening the door and leaving. Claire heard a light 'thud' as Emily got on the roof.

Up on the roof Hitsugaya was sleeping soundly in his gigai. Emily gently sprayed the whipped cream on his hand. She then lightly tickled his face with the yarn. Once she'd noticed he was on the roof Emily couldn't resist doing something to him. After Emily had dragged the yarn across Hitsugaya's face for the fifth time his right hand moved to scratch the itch in his sleep. After he scratched the itch Emily had to resist laughing as she got off the roof. As soon as she was back inside she burst out laughing. Claire figured what she'd done so she also had a grin on her face.

_"Who was the innocent victim?" _Claire asked as she herself restrained from laughing.

_"Midget." _Emily answered between laughs.

About two hours later both Claire and Emily heard a _very _angry Hitsugaya get off the roof.

A/N: Sorry this took so long. I'm trying to multi-task by reading a POT fic, read POT manga/ watch various animes, and write this fic all at once. Well school starts Monday for me so once that happens I won't update as much. Also, MY COMPUTER LIVES!!!!!!!!!!!! My dad fixed it so now I can do what ever without worrying about them scolding me on my choice of words (my parents are anti-swearing. Normally I don't swear either but occasionally I'm just in that mood.) Just wondering, did anyone go to Anime Iowa (the convention)? My brother and sister went (I wasn't allowed due to the fact that my parents don't think I'm old enough) and brought me back posters so I was wondering if anyone else went. Currently I'm just happy that my computer is fixed so I can see my wonderful Shiro-chan background and Shiro-chan poster _at the same time. _Well please review!!! Don't forget to try and guess what is going on in Emily's dream!


	10. Black Out

**The American Student**

A/N: I'm sooo sorry about the delay. I haven't been able to fit in much writing because of schoolwork. I'm in what you might call an 'accelerated program' (our teachers joke and I know have called it the 'more homework academy' before). Honestly, it's actually probably the largest gathering of ADD or ADHD kids in the state. Well anyhow, I actually have been thinking a lot about the sequel that I'm going to do for this fic. I know it is a bit of a bad idea to think about that before this is finished. Well here you go! Oh by the way, anyone happen to know how to make an AMV and what program to do so?

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

See chapter two for font key.

Chapter Ten: Black Out

Claire was staring out the window during class. For some reason she just couldn't concentrate on the lesson. It might have had something to do with the fact that she skipped breakfast because it took her so long to get Emily up and she was now starving. She just wanted to get to lunch.

An hour later Claire was happily munching on pocky at lunch. She was only half listening to Hitsugaya complain about waking up with his face covered in whipped cream. Emily was trying to hide her rather large grin behind a book.

After school a hollow appeared and Claire and Emily went running towards it. Claire quickly materialized her zanpakto and attacked. Unfortunately, this hollow was strong. It swung its hand and Claire barely dodged. She went in towards it again but once again had to dodge as it swung its hand again. Then it extended its free arm and slammed Claire into a tree. Claire plunged her zanpakto into the ground.

"Ensnare, Soshi Zassou!" Within seconds vines of fire, ice, and stone had wrapped themselves around the hollow and another vine pierced the hollow's head. It began to dissolve and when it had completely disappeared Claire resealed her zanpakto and let the sword dissolve into reiatsu. That's when Claire panicked. Emily did, too. Hitsugaya was approaching, fast. Fast as in shunpo speed. As in Claire, being sealed in her body, couldn't use shunpo and Emily wasn't a shinigami type of speed. They ran as fast as they could in the opposite direction.

As Hitsugaya arrived he could still feel the fading reiatsu and saw movement in the distance. He was fed up with not knowing what was going on so he chased after the quickly vanishing reiatsu.

Claire and Emily knew that no matter what, Hitsugaya would catch up. He would feel Claire's reiatsu and he would know. They were screwed. Suddenly Claire decided to take drastic measures. A few years ago she and Emily had discovered that if reiatsu was forced into the spot where Claire's seal was, they could temporarily black out almost all of Claire's shinigami powers. Everything except the ability to see ghosts, shinigami, and hollows was completely disabled for about seventy-two hours. There were two reasons why this was generally not used; one was that it hurt like hell for almost the whole time her powers were gone. The other was that if Claire was attacked during that period of time she would have to completely rely. There was also another small issue, if someone with reiatsu were to have any part of their body touch her seal their powers, shinigami or not, would black out for about an hour or two. That would definitely clue them into the fact that she was hiding something.

Hitsugaya was approaching fast so she didn't have time to debate.

_"Em, apply reiatsu to my seal. It will have to do for now if we don't want him knowing."_ Claire said as they ran. Emily looked at her. She looked as if she was deciding if she should for a moment then nodded. She gathered reiatsu around her hand and reached over to force it into Claire's seal. This strengthened the seal, which is what caused the reaction. Claire stopped and Emily watched as her friend shot her hand to where her seal was. Claire's eyes flashed the bright red of pain and then faded to a normal green shade as her reiatsu faded.

Claire's seal felt like it had just been stabbed by one of her zanpakto's vines of fire. Emily walked closer just as Hitsugaya appeared. He had been sure that he had felt the reiatsu only moments ago coming from that very spot. What he saw now was Claire and Emily. He could tell that Claire looked like she was in pain and that her hand was clamped over where Rukia had said her seal was.

"_Let's go back to the apartment now." _Emily said and Claire only nodded as she followed Emily and slowly unclamped her hand and readjusted her shirt so that her seal was covered.

Hitsugaya was confused of what he had just seen. Claire had appeared to be in pain but he saw no wounds. Emily had seemed completely fine but the look on her face had seemed like she was sorry for something. Something had happened and he had a feeling that tomorrow he would find out what had happened.

When Claire and Emily had arrived back at their apartment Emily plopped on the floor while Claire went to find the pain meds. When Claire sat on the floor across from Emily, Emily could already tell how much Claire hated having her reiatsu blacked out. The look in her eyes said it all. Claire had been a shinigami for as far back as she could remember and she felt naked with out her reiatsu.

"_Before you start complaining, it's only for three days. Also, you asked me to." _Emily reminded Claire. Claire sighed. She lifted up her hand and stared at it.

"_I know… but I hate not having the feeling of reiatsu flowing through my body. It just doesn't feel natural…"_ Claire said.

"_Have you forgotten that before I met you I didn't have reiatsu twenty-four seven?" _Emily pointed out. Claire lowered her hand. They both knew it was going to be a _long_ three days. Emily knew that she would have to deal with Claire tomorrow when she would need something to do the whole time to keep her mind off her temporary reiatsu black out.

An hour later they had finished their homework and Emily had declared that she was going out for a bit.

"_Why?" _Claire asked from her place on the floor. Sitting beside her was an almost-empty bottle of pain killers and a bottle of water.

"_Because you're going to run out soon." _Emily said as she gestured to the tiny bottle. Claire nodded and Emily slipped on her shoes and grabbed her bag before leaving. Emily had decided that she would get the pain meds, but she also decided that she would stop by the book store before heading to the Urahara Shoten. She had thought of one thing that Claire's parents generally didn't approve of that would keep Claire's mind off of her reiatsu: yaoi manga.

Emily was in and out of the book store in a grand total of three minutes. She only bought three, but the art was good so she figured that Claire would read them multiple times. She continued on her way to the Urahara Shoten.

When Emily arrived at the Urahara Shoten she was half surprised that Ururu and Jinta weren't outside sweeping. Instead, they were outside raking. They looked up and they seemed confused for a moment.

"Where's Bard?" Jinta asked.

"Apartment." Emily answered. She walked through the open door and immediately went to find the pain killers. Yoruichi was on top of the counter and looked at her. Emily didn't even notice her. She kneeled down and looked at the different brands. She had absolutely no clue which one Claire wanted. Just when she was about to pull out her cell and call Claire when she was interrupted.

"It's the one on the far left." Urahara said. Emily spun around, slightly surprised.

"Oh, hi Urahara-san." Emily said. "So is the one on the far left Claire buys?"

"Yes. Speaking of Claire, where is she?" Urahara asked.

"At our apartment, probably going out of her mind in boredom." Emily said. Urahara was a bit confused.

"Why didn't she come with you then?" Urahara asked.

"Because she's not in the best of moods."

"_Understatement." _Claire said as she stepped into the small store. Emily looked at her friend curiously. Claire answered her silent question. _"You were taking to long and I decided to find out what was taking you so long." _Emily just raised the bag of books and threw it to Claire. She caught it and pulled one out. _"Thanks." _

"_No problem. I figured that if I didn't get something to distract you, you would drive me insane." _Emily said with a slight smirk.

"What's exactly going on?" Urahara finally asked. Only when Claire looked him in the eye and he saw her eyes did he start to get the gist of things. "Your reiatsu…" Urahara was slightly shocked by the fact that just by the normal coloring of Claire's eyes it was obvious that something was wrong with her reiatsu.

"Is it really that obvious?" Claire asked.

"A bit, but what exactly happened?" Urahara asked. He was curious as to what happened.

"Let's just leave it at because I almost got caught, I had to temporarily black out my reiatsu." Claire said. Even though Urahara already knew, she didn't feel like telling him about her seal as well and its 'features'.

"Does it have anything to do with your seal?" Now that caught both Claire and Emily a bit off guard. How the heck did he know about her seal?

"How do you know about my seal?" Claire asked a bit defensively.

"Yoruichi saw it and told me." Urahara said. Emily and Claire glanced at Yoruichi, who was still on top of the counter observing the scene. "But you didn't answer my question, does it have anything to do with your seal?" Claire and Emily, both still slightly irked that he knew what he shouldn't, simply nodded. Urahara found it slightly amusing how childish they acted when they found out he knew about Claire's seal. He decided that he would have to drag the full answer out of them. "So exactly what did you do that involves your seal that causes your reiatsu to black out?" Emily muttered something in English under her breath that sounded like _"nosy"_.

"I just shoved some reiatsu down her seal. It gives it a power boost that is enough to completely shut down her reiatsu for about three days." Emily finally answered.

"My seal hurts like hell the whole time, just so you understand why I need the pain killers." Claire added.

"What kind of seal is it?" Urahara asked.

"No clue. Don't really care." Claire said. That seemed to end their conversation. They paid for the pain killers and went home.

"Honestly, it would be nice if they would just give us the whole story sometime." Urahara said.

"I doubt they ever will." Yoruichi said. Urahara nodded in agreement and sighed.

Back at their apartment it was starting to get dark. Claire was completely absorbed in her manga and Emily was on the roof. She was in deep thought. She was considering everything that had happened since she had known Claire. She remembered that when she had confided in Claire that she could see ghosts, Claire laughed her head off. Emily had been so insulted until Claire and her great-grandpa had explained everything. She even remembered how that when they were four they had made Halloween costumes that were copies of a shinigami uniform. The neighbors had given them such a strange look when they told them what they were dressed as.

--Flash Back—

"_And what are you two dressed as?" One of their neighbors had asked. _

"_Death Gods." They had answered cheerfully in unison. The neighbor looked up and stared at Claire's great-grandpa. _

"_I thought it was cute…" William had muttered under his breath. _

--End Flashback—

Emily continued to think about all the memories they had shared. She finally pulled a picture that she always carried with her out of her pants pocket. She unfolded a group picture that showed Claire, Emily, Callie, Hana, and William at a pool in the summer. Emily remembered that Callie's mom had taken the picture and it was when they were six, one month before William had been killed. She stared at the familiar faces. William was fully clothed, and looking much too young to be a great-grandpa, whereas the girls were all wearing swimsuits. Emily had been so absorbed in the memory that she hadn't noticed Hitsugaya.

"When was that picture taken?" Hitsugaya suddenly asked as he looked at it over Emily's shoulder. He recognized the man in there from some where, but he couldn't quite place him. Emily looked at Hitsugaya.

"About seven years ago when I was six." Emily answered.

"Why does it look like there are two Claires on that picture?" Hitsugaya asked.

"Because one is Claire and one is Claire's sister, Hana." Emily answered.

"Who all is in the picture?" Hitsugaya interrogated.

"Why does it matter?" Emily asked.

"No reason in particular, you just seemed really absorbed by it."

"Well it isn't really any of your business." Emily answered in a tone that clearly signaled that Hitsugaya shouldn't ask again. She looked at the picture for a moment longer then folded it up and put it back in her pocket.

The next day Claire was still slightly irked that she would have to wait until tomorrow for her reiatsu to return. They entered the classroom and Emily fell asleep. Claire soon noticed the arrival of Hitsugaya and Matsumoto. Hitsugaya sat down and looked at Claire. She was looking out the window but as Ochi-sensei walked in she shook Emily awake and glanced towards the clock on the wall, this allowed Hitsugaya to see her face. It took him a second to realize it but then he saw that her eyes were, well… normal. He realized that the normal reiatsu that discolored them wasn't there.

The day passed slowly to Claire. Not having her reiatsu was driving her crazy and it was only just the beginning of lunch. She and Emily sat down and were joined by Matsumoto and Hitsugaya.

"Your eyes are a normal color today." Hitsugaya stated the obvious.

"I never said they couldn't be." Claire retorted. Matsumoto could feel the temperature lower a few degrees. Claire stood up and headed for the stairs, presumably the bathroom.

"Do either of you two know if there is a piano anywhere in this school?" Emily suddenly asked.

"I think there might be one down the hall from the classroom, why?" Hitsugaya asked curiously.

"Cause I think it might do Claire some good to play it." Emily said. They did not ask what Emily meant because Claire had returned.

After school Emily grabbed Claire's wrist and dragged her towards the door.

_"What are you doing?" _Claire asked.

_"I heard there was a piano around here. You are going to play it and distract yourself for a while." _Emily said. She dragged her friend and searched every room until they found one that was empty except for a few chairs and a piano. Emily dragged Claire over to the piano and sat her down on the bench in front of it. Then she pulled out some sheets of music from her bag and put them on the piano.

_"Play before you go insane and make me tempted to bind and gag you in a closet." _Emily ordered. Claire didn't mind that much so she just sighed and chose a piece out of the music Emily had provided. Claire wasn't great at the piano, but she could play well enough. She chose a piano arrangement of Memory by Sugarcult.

Hitsugaya, Matsumoto, Ichigo, and Rukia heard the sound of the piano and followed the noise to its source. They found Emily sitting in a chair eating pocky and Claire at the piano. They stood in the doorway and Emily glanced up at them. She didn't say anything but simply held up a finger to her lips so they would know not to say anything. After that she went back to her pocky. The group of four stood there and listened for a while, the tune was unfamiliar to them.

After a while Claire switched to a different song: a piano arrangement of Thanks For The Memories by Fall Out Boy. Claire sung quietly as she played. When the song was finished Claire turned around to face the four standing in the doorway.

"How long do you intend to stand there for?" Claire asked.

"Does it bother you, Bard-san?" Rukia asked in her fake polite voice. Claire didn't answer but instead turned around to play again.

After a few more minutes Rukia walked further into the room and was going to look at what Claire was playing. She walked up and then her foot caught Claire's bag. And she was falling. Her hand reached out for Claire.

For. Right. Where. Her. Seal. Was.

A/N: I know, not one of my best chapters but my mind is half dead from home work right now. I probably won't update for a while (again). I might get more time in once cross country season is over but I don't know. Well I hope you liked it! Please review!


	11. Picture Album

**The American Student**

A/N: Well I'm glad I have a four-day weekend; I really need a break from my cross-country coach (who is also my social studies teacher so the "I have too much homework to go to practice today" excuse isn't a good idea.) and from band class (I swear, no matter how many times I practice, I can't play The Simpsons to save my life). I'm annoyed with veoh for making everything a five-minute preview thing now. Well I'm sure you don't really care. So on with the story!

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

See chapter two for font key.

Chapter Eleven: Picture Album

_"Claire! Move!" _Emily shouted as she sprung up from her chair. Claire quickly turned around and grabbed Rukia's hand and used her other arm to grab her around the waist before she fell. Claire and Emily's minds were spinning. That had been _way _too close. If she had touched her seal…

The three standing in the doorway and Rukia looked from Emily, whose sudden outburst wasn't expected, to Claire, who seemed to make sure that Rukia wouldn't touch where her seal was. Rukia stood up after she got over the shock. Claire let go of her wrist and waist. They were all quiet for a few moments. Claire and Emily looked at each other, not sure what to say.

"Are you okay, Kuchiki-san?" Claire finally asked after a minute or so.

"Uh… yeah." Rukia answered. Claire stood up then reached down to grab her bag.

"We should get going." Emily said as she grabbed her own bag and headed for the door. Claire followed after her, leaving the four shinigami to ponder what had just happened.

"What was that just about?" Ichigo asked out loud to nobody in particular.

"I have no clue, but wasn't it weird how Bard-san grabbed Rukia's hand and _then _made sure she didn't fall?" Matsumoto pointed out.

"That's because she was reaching for where Bard-san's 'tattoo' is." Hitsugaya said after he realized that that was where Rukia had been about to touch.

As Emily and Claire arrived back at their apartment they saw Orihime standing in front of their apartment with a brown cardboard box that was clearly something that had come in the mail. When Orihime saw Claire and Emily she waved. When they reached her Orihime spoke.

"They dropped this package off at my door by mistake, it's for you." Orihime held out the package and Claire took it.

"Oh, thanks. It's from my parents." Claire said as she looked at the return address. She opened the package right there with a pocketknife. Inside was two letters and what looked like a photo album. Emily unlocked the door and she and Claire walked inside.

"Oh, Inoue-san, you can come in if you want." Emily said.

"Thanks." Orihime walked in and closed the door behind her. They all sat down and Claire tossed one of the letters to Emily. On the envelope was Emily's name and it said it was from her family. Emily opened hers at the same time Claire opened her own.

Both girls quickly read their letters and then laughed.

"_They let me go to a foreign country and the first letter I get from them is reminder that if they hear I've blown anything up, hi-jacked any cars, screwed with school computers, or gotten into any fights that I'll be in huge trouble when I get home! Oh, and that they love me and miss me. I'm half surprised my brother didn't ask me to buy him a video game while I was here."_ Emily said with a slight smirk. _"Geez, they make it sound like they don't trust me at all." _

"_Mine says how much they miss me. Oh, and just a friendly reminder to make sure that you don't cause any trouble. Wait, in small writing at the bottom they remind me not to break anyone's bones. Apparently they still think I wasn't just doing that to defend Hana." _Claire said. _"And Cain actually didn't ask for a video game? Wow…" _Cain was Emily's sixteen year-old brother. He was a video game addict and probably had wanted to ask Emily to get a game but had probably been denied. He looked nothing like Emily, with his dark brown hair. And also unlike Emily, his eyes were a pale green instead of a magnificent teal.

Orihime stared blankly at the two girls, she hadn't understood a word they said. Claire realized this.

"Oh, basically Emily's letter was reminding her not to do any serious damage to Karakura and mine was a classic parent to child letter. You know, the whole 'sweetie, remember to brush your teeth every night' kind of thing." Claire summarized.

"What exactly do you mean by 'serious damage'?" Orihime asked a bit apprehensively. Claire smirked a bit and Emily didn't look thrilled.

"I mean like arson, screwing with computers, breaking and entering. That sort of thing." Claire managed to say without laughing.

"Actually, it was accidentally setting part of the local park on fire with a firework when it wasn't forth of July; breaking through the school district's internet blockers to check my e-mail and accidentally crashing the whole computer in the process. Oh, and picking a few locks to retrieve my math homework from my locker after school was out for the day and the school was locked. But Claire just likes to make it sound fifty times worse than it was," Emily said a bit defensively, but with slight amusement at the same time some how.

Orihime wasn't quite sure what to make of this information. Thankfully, she didn't have to say anything because Claire had just pulled out the photo album. Emily and Orihime scooted closer to get a better look at it. Claire opened to the first page and got an expression that Orihime couldn't really connect an emotion too. It was some mix of sadness, pain, happiness, and something else. The first four pictures of the album all had much younger versions of Claire and Emily, and an older man that appeared to be in his sixties (Emily and Claire knew he was _way_ older than that) but was still very fit. In all of the pictures they were happy and smiling, just having a good time in general.

All remained silent as the three girls stared at the pictures for a moment. Eventually Claire flipped the page to reveal eight more pictures, seven of which had the same man in them. The one that didn't have that man was a picture of Emily and Claire in hand-to-hand combat. They were probably about only four in the picture. Both girls were sweating hard and were scratched up a bit, serious looks of concentration on their faces. Through those serious looks Orihime could still tell that they were having a good time.

"Oi, Orihime, are you in there?" Someone asked as they knocked on the door. Claire got up and opened the door. There stood Hitsugaya and Matsumoto. Hitsugaya and looked behind Claire and saw Orihime.

"Hitsugaya-kun, Rangiku-san, were you looking for me?" Orihime asked.

"Yeah, you weren't in your apartment and neither of us has a key to get in. What are you doing here?" Hitsugaya said. Claire had gone back to her seat on the floor.

"We were looking at pictures Claire-san (1) and Lund-san got sent from America." Orihime explained. "Why don't you look with us?"

"I guess I don't really care." Emily said and Claire nodded in agreement.

"Taicho, let's look!" Matsumoto said a bit enthusiastically. Hitsugaya shrugged and they came in, shutting the door behind them. Once everyone was seated so the could see, they looked at the pictures again. Instantly, Hitsugaya picked out the man in the picture and tried to recall why it seemed vaguely familiar.

"Bard, who's the guy in the picture?" Hitsugaya asked. Claire knew that Hitsugaya had noticed him; this could be problematic.

"My great-grandpa." Claire gave as a response. Hitsugaya only nodded and Emily turned the page. Eight more pictures were shown. There was one with a young Claire holding a black cat (2), one with Emily and an older boy what appeared to be arguing, one with a picture of Claire and Emily's two families standing together laughing, and there was one more. This one made Claire and Emily smirk a bit and the other three really confused.

"What idiot let five year-olds play with real katanas?!?" Hitsugaya asked slightly confused.

"Not an idiot, my great-grandpa. And we were four, not five." Claire answered, faking a slightly hurt tone.

"He let you play with them? What did your parents say?" Matsumoto asked.

"Our parents didn't know. Claire lived with her great-grandpa until…" Emily's voice trailed off a bit, "well she lived with him for a while and my parents were busy cutting people open at work." Emily's parents were both surgeons at a hospital in the city. Thus leaving Emily and Cain in the care of a friend's parents during the day.

"They didn't know." Hitsugaya restated incredulously. He couldn't believe that they were four years old at the time and playing with swords. Sure enough though, in the picture Emily and Claire were each holding a sword and appeared to be at a temporary tie in the battle. For that was exactly what it was, battle and not play. Both of them had been taught since they were little to fight hollows and William Bard did so by letting them fight with real katanas and fists, of course there were no pictures of them fighting with reiatsu. The page was turned once again, revealing a new set of pictures.

Ten minutes later Claire turned the page for the umpteenth time to reveal pictures she knew she would kill Hana for back in America. All eight pictures were of William Bard's funeral. Five of which were showing Emily and Claire. The first one showed Emily and Claire leaning against a thick oak tree, leaning on each other hand in hand on the ground. Claire seemed to be staring off into nowhere, eyes pale, emotionless and the same dull gray you would see on a random stone by a river. Emily had her eye's closed and had streaks of red skin on her cheeks from tears. Both girls wearing white blouses and black dress pants.

The second picture showed the two girls staring down at the casket containing the deceased. Claire's eyes were now a deep blue of sorrow as she looked upon William, who was out of view of the picture.

The third showed Claire standing with her eyes closed with tears streaming from them, Emily held her friend from behind with her arms draped around her neck like jewelry.

The fourth showed them being held in a group hug by Cain. He smiled slightly as if to try and smile for them, too.

The fifth and final one with Emily and Claire showed the two girls lying on nearby tables, staring straight up into the mid-fall sky.

Claire quickly stood, "I'm going to the bathroom." She walked off, leaving the three guests with Emily.

"Who died?" Orihime asked Emily quietly.

"Claire's great-grandpa." Emily practically whispered. All tone of the normal light-heartedness in her voice vanished as she stared at the pictures with expressionless eyes. Emily had felt like William had been her own great-grandpa when he was alive and seeing these pictures dealt her a mental blow, though probably not quite as hard a blow as Claire received. Seeing these pictures made memories that had been buried flow back to the front of her mind. She saw flashes of the funeral; Claire's parents crying, murmurs of condolences, whispers of how the death was so sudden; the actual scene of the murder as she watched on with Claire, completely helpless against his killers. The last scene was what scared her most, the words she wished were false, but had been proved true before.

-- Flash back--

_Claire was curled up in a ball, her zanpakto lying next to her as it consumed more reiatsu to keep materialized. Claire was sweating hard, having just finished practicing some more. That was all she had been doing for the past two months after William's funeral, practicing every day in the basement of hidden building in the forest as soon as she got out of school. The basement was entirely concrete and large enough to practice with plenty of room. Emily opened the sliding wood door and stepped inside to see her friend._

_Claire's parents were worried sick about their oldest daughter, which they had no idea of her location after school for hours. Only Emily and Callie knew. _

_Emily instinctively sat next to her friend and wrapped her arms around her. She had set the food she brought on the floor in front of Claire, knowing she might not be back at her house in time for dinner._

_"Emily?" Claire asked to make sure her friend was listening._

_"Yeah?" Normally Claire didn't say much after her training._

_"I will reach it, I will kill them." Claire said. Emily knew who the 'them' was and also knew what the 'it' was. Emily just let go of her friend and looked at her with a slightly happy look._

_"I know you will, cause I'll help you do it." At that the girls stood up and went in the basement, reaching toward one thing together._

--End Flash Back—

Claire had reached 'it'. And half of the 'them' was dead.

Hitsugaya, Matsumoto, and Orihime all looked at the pictures. The expressions Claire and Emily wore were not those of six year olds. No, it was clear that that event had made them older then six on the inside. Claire and Emily knew it too. That moment that William Bard stopped breathing… that moment had made them age in an instant.

Claire walked back into the room, now composed again, and flipped the page to a much happier set of pictures.

Half an hour later, Hitsugaya had learned very little more about Claire. As the three guests stood up to leave Emily pulled something else out of the box, a DVD.

_"Hey, Claire, what do you think is on here?" _

_"My guess is Hana made a home movie." _Claire stood up and left the room for a moment. When she returned she had her laptop.

"Do you three want to see what my little sister filmed?" Claire asked Hitsugaya, Matsumoto, and Rangiku. The three sat back down so that all five people could see the screen as Claire turned on the laptop and slid in the DVD.

Emily and Claire instantly recognized where this video had been taken. It was their last sparring match before Claire had left for Japan. It was a no-reiatsu, hand-to-hand combat spar and they hadn't ever noticed Hana was filming them.

Claire and Emily were expertly dodging and blocking each other's moves, knowing their opponent well. Claire got a solid kick on Emily's back and Emily elbowed Claire on the inner thigh at the same time. Both hit the floor in an almost animal-like position; one knee on the floor as one was extended behind them with both hands on the floor to stop them from skittering any further back. As soon as they could, they both launched themselves forward again. This continued for a long time.

Hitsugaya, Matsumoto, and Orihime stared at the two girls fight hard against the other. Hitsugaya was slightly pissed as he realized that Claire had held back against him.

After a while a screen with text replaced the fight that still hadn't ended. It read _'now for something a lot further back, thank me for being able to get these off VHS _(3)_'_. There was a moment of darkness and then there was a scene of a three-year-old Claire with William.

_"Will, why are you banging your head in the wall?" _The younger Claire asked William in a cute, little kid voice. William muttered something in Japanese that sounded like 'because 'ichi' and 'ichigo' are **not **the same thing…' Claire continued to look confused at her great-grandpa.

The text screen showed up again. '_Don't ask me why he was filming any of this…' _

A new screen appeared, probably from the same day because they were still wearing the same clothes. Claire was now attempting to fight William, it was really cute. William was on his knees and Claire was kneeing him over and over in the stomach; William appeared to be unaffected.

_"Claire-chan, put more weight into it, I know you can do it!" _William said encouragingly. Claire did as she was told and put more weight into it… and fell over.

The text screen once again interrupted the video: _'I love the next one…'_

Emily and Claire looked were five in the video, Claire already had her necklace that she always wore hanging from her neck. They were sitting on the floor in the same room the other videos had been filmed.

_"So how do you say Japan?" _William asked, his gaze directed at Emily. Emily smiled.

_"That's easy, Japan." _Emily said, emphasizing each syllable of Japan. William shook his head.

_"No, _Nihon (4)_." _William corrected. Emily cocked her head to the side a bit, she didn't get it.

_"But I thought you asked me to say Japan. What's _Nihon_?" _Emily questioned. William let out an exasperated groan.

_"Emily, _Nihon_ is Japan." _William explained, but Emily still misunderstood.

_"_Nihon_ is in Japan? Is it near Tokyo or something?" _Emily asked clueless. Claire covered her mouth with a hand to stifle her laughter. William slapped his forehead with his palm.

_"No, Emily. _Nihon_ is Japanese for Japan." _William now had his head in his palm, exhausted from trying to teach the two girls Japanese.

_"Oh, I get it! Why didn't you say so before?" _Claire could no longer hold back her laughter, she removed her hand and rolled onto her back laughing at her friend.

The next text screen read '_I really owe you for this one…_'

The camera was clearly unsteady and obviously not being held by Hana because she was in the picture. A small group of boys, maybe five or six, were grouped around Hana and appeared to be yelling at her. Finally the first punch was thrown at Hana and she ducked. After that kicks and punches were coming from all sides. Hana had thrown up her arms around her head. Soon you could hear Claire as she came rushing to help.

_"Get the hell away from her!" _Claire didn't wait for them to; instead, she pushed Hana out of the center and immediately began beating the crap out of the ten year olds. They didn't stand a chance as Claire threw her hard and accurate kicks and knees to the stomach. Even from the who ever was holding the camera's distance you could still hear a few faint _crack!_s as bones were shattered.

An adult came running in and separated the fight. As the camera shook a bit more you could see Emily standing off to the side looking bored.

Back in the present Claire popped out the DVD and shut down the laptop. She set the two things off to the side and looked back at the onlookers.

"Soooo… interesting video, wasn't it?" Claire said. Emily was smirking after that last video. Hitsugaya and Matsumoto didn't know what to say, Orihime did.

"You two were so cute when you were little!" Orihime squealed. Emily and Claire looked at each other.

"Err, thanks… I guess." Emily said.

"What was with that first part of the video? The one of you two fighting." Hitsugaya asked.

"Just a friendly sparring match." Claire answered.

"If it was so friendly then why did it appear that you two weren't holding back?" Hitsugaya probed further.

"Who said we weren't?" The two girls said in unison, smirking.

From there on for the next half an hour they talked about the video and the pictures. Soon the three guests had to leave and said good bye, leaving Claire and Emily alone in the room.

_"Think letting them see some of those pictures and that DVD is gonna cause issues?" _Emily wondered.

_"Oh yeah. But I'm up for the challenge." _The two girls smiled and got up to make some good ol' Easy-Mac for dinner.

A/N: So what do you think? This chapter was sort of a filler for the fic but it did give a bit of background. Also, I left a huge hint in this chapter as to what Emily's 'red and black' memory was. Also, when Claire called William 'Will' instead of great-grandpa, I'm trying to show that William was more laid back and so could care less if his great-granddaughter called him by his first name.

(1)- Just to make sure you remember, in one of the first chapters Claire asks Orihime to call her 'Claire-san' instead of 'Bard-san' saying that she still isn't use to being called by her surname.

(2)- If you remember from chapter two, it is revealed that Claire is the owner of a black cat named Midnight.

(3)-I'm pretty sure VHS is the term for old videos instead of DVDs, I've always just called them videos but I figured I should try and use the right term.

(4)- According to my Everyday Japanese book, Nihon is the term for Japan, but I've also seen it as Nippon. For this fic I will use Nihon though.


	12. Returning Home

**The American Student**

A/N: Sorry for the wait, but I had a bunch of tests this week in class so I couldn't really get much of a break. I really hope that you guys won't hate what is coming, but it just popped into my head today during lunch with a friend and I ended up playing with the idea all the rest of the day. Well, I hope you enjoy the chapter! Also, I really want to know how these events go over with all of you.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

See chapter two for font key.

Chapter Twelve: Returning Home

About a week had passed since the picture album and DVD incident and Claire had happily gotten her reiatsu back. Currently Emily and Claire were sitting in class on a Monday morning, the time that no human being should have to be in class at 9 A.M. Emily was barely awake and Claire was lost in her own reverie.

She was thinking of how on Monday mornings back in America Emily would always show up to school with a can of Mountain Dew (except for in the winter, when she replaced the pop with a French vanilla cappuccino from the McDonalds around the corner) in one hand and the case for her flute in the other. Claire would be eating caffeine filled mints and have her sheet music for the piano shoved into her bag. Callie would be drinking some really strong black coffee from the local coffee house and would be holding the cup with both hands as she smelled and drank the dark liquid in attempt to wake up.

All three girls lived fairly close to their private school, one that was generally reserved for the children of couples who were fairly well off financially. It was called Pirum (1) Academy (which they all agreed was a sort of dumb name). The school was pretty laid back, they had uniforms that were optional and always there for those who wished to wear them. Personally, Claire wasn't going to wear hers mainly because of the fact that she would have to wear dress shoes with the white button up long-sleeved guys-dress-shirt-styled shirt; short, gray pleated skirt; short black tie; and knee-high black, silver, and teal blue socks. She much preferred her tennis shoes and jeans to dress shoes and a short skirt (one that was almost shorter than her current uniform). Callie wore her uniform daily; she actually had a remotely feminine figure unlike her two best friends and looked nice in the uniform. Also, when a hollow came she wasn't going to be running after it (though she was able to fight pretty well, she couldn't see hollows so fighting _them_ was out of the question).

Claire was instantly snapped out of her memories when a flying piece of chalk nailed the side of her head. Claire was yanked back into the present. She faced the front and noticed that Emily had been aimed at as well, but had caught the projectile as usual.

"Pay attention." Ochi-sensei commanded before resuming her lesson.

The rest of class until lunch passed slowly, like when you're reading a history textbook. When Claire and Emily walked up to the roof they sat down and soon found themselves in the company of Matsumoto and Hitsugaya.

"So are you going to give me a different reason for you two sparring?" Hitsugaya questioned, the same question as he had been asking them almost every day at lunch since he had seen the DVD. He was no idiot; Hitsugaya could just see that it wasn't 'just a friendly sparring match'. _No,_ he thought, _it was something more, something that looked more like real battle. It looked as if they did that pretty frequently, like it was _training_ for them. But if they were training-_ Hitsugaya cut off his train of thought, he knew it would just go in a circle because it was the same thought train that he had been mulling over in his mind since he had seen the DVD. He always came at the roadblock of the fact that there was only a supposed mark on the girl and even then he hadn't seen it himself for evidence.

"Nope." The two girls replied in unison.

The rest of lunch was fairly dull. There was the usual teasing and taunting, but other than that it was uneventful. They had all returned to the classroom now and were seated. Ochi-sensei began the lessons again. It was normal.

At the end of the school day Claire and Emily returned home as usual. They had formed a mildly normal routine and over the past week it hadn't really been broken aside from the occasional appearance of a hollow.

The next day Claire and Emily went to class as usual. Emily was sleeping and it was Claire's job to make sure she wasn't caught by Ochi-sensei.

Elsewhere…

_"Hey, Cain?" _Callie said as she walked fast to keep up with the older boy.

_"What?" _

_"Do you know where we're going?"_

_"Eh? I thought you knew how to get there!" _The pale-eyed boy looked down in a cross between shock and confusion at the caramel-haired girl who was giving him the same look.

_"You were the one with the map!" _Both had now stopped walking.

_"What? I thought you had it!" _

_"You mean we're lost?"_ Cain asked. Callie only sighed and nodded before speaking.

_"You think we should just call Claire and Emily?"_

_"No way, they're in class. I say we just go into that gas station over there and ask for directions."_

_"Fine." _And so the two teens headed for the gas station in hopes of some sort of directions to Karakura High School.

Back at school an hour later, there was a knock on the classroom door.

"Will Lund Emily and Bard Claire please step out side the classroom for a moment?" Came the voice of the principal as he opened the sliding door to reveal the principal. Next to him stood a tall, thin, dark-brown-haired, light-green-eyed, peach-skinned teenage boy. Next to him was an average height, tan-skinned, caramel-haired, golden-eyed, thin, and feminine-looking girl. Claire and Emily stared.

_"Callie? Cain? What are you guys doing here?" _Emily asked in surprise. The two got out of their chairs and walked through the doors to join the two other Americans and the principal.

"The situation has been explained to me and I have approved." Was all the principal said before he left. Claire and Emily looked at Cain and Callie with questioning looks.

_"Well,"_ Callie took a deep breath, _"on Saturday Hana got hit by a car." _If either Claire or Emily had had something in their hands, they would have dropped it.

_"WHAT?"_ Emily roared, while Claire just stood there with a look of complete and total disbelief. Her sister had been hit by a car…

_"Relax, she's alive. She just got pretty banged up." _Cain explained.

_"What do you mean by 'banged up' exactly?"_ Claire interrogated.

_"Err… only a few broken ribs, bruises, broken bones throughout other areas of the body." _Callie said. Claire was still shocked by what she had been told. Emily had plenty to say.

_"Who the _hell_ hit her?!?" _Emily demanded, reverting to her bad habit of swearing in whatever language she wasn't saying the rest of the sentence in when she was angry.

"_Some drunk driver, he's already been arrested." _Cain said.

_"What was the principal talking about before he left?" _Claire asked.

_"Oh, your parents want you guys to come home for a bit. You know, so you guys can visit Hana and everyone. We've all missed you."_ Callie explained. _"So you're both skipping the rest of today to 'pack'."_ Callie actually made air quotes when she said 'pack'. In other words, they'll goof off for a while and then pack.

_"When does our plane leave?" _Emily asked.

_"Tomorrow at 11 a.m. Japan time."_ Cain answered. Emily and Claire both nodded. Claire was still a bit out of it, her little sister was hurt, and _badly_.

They chatted a few more minutes before Claire and Emily went into the classroom again and grabbed their things while Callie explained the situation to the teacher, how they would be gone for a while on 'family matters'. Ochi-sensei agreed, still surprised by the fact that the girl could speak Japanese.

The four Americans left and first headed to the apartment so that Claire and Emily could change into normal clothing. After that they stopped by a fast food place and then just decided to go back to the apartment to catch up. Well, while the three girls caught up; all Cain did was play on his PSP.

The three girls were glad to see each other again, Cain wouldn't say it but he was glad to see his sister again. On the other hand, they all wished that it was under different circumstances. The chatted until late and pretty much they all just slept where they sat. None of them dared to say anything about the shinigami or arrancar with Cain in earshot.

The next day Emily and Claire threw together suitcases as fast as possible. They found themselves rushing out the doors and just barely catching the bus that went to the airport. When they did get to the airport the checked in their luggage and practically ran to their flight area. They got there just as the first line of people was being let onto the airplane. Soon they were let on and found seats. Claire had taken her laptop on as a carry-on and Emily had taken her book. Callie had her ever-present iPod and Cain had his PSP. The flight was surprisingly quiet and Claire and Emily both realized how exhausted they were.

Callie Wood was no idiot. She could tell that the whole time that they were in the apartment that Claire and Emily had wanted to say something but every time it seemed as if they were about to bring it up they would glance at Cain. She had a pretty good idea what it was about, but exactly what it was she had only a faint idea. She sighed, this was one of the few times her natural gift for reading people failed her. Her mother had always said that she got her looks from her and her personality from her dad. Both her parents were therapists, and good ones at that. Her dad especially, he was pretty good at reading his patients body language and expressions so he generally could put a name to whatever emotion his patient was feeling before they could.

She looked at her two best friends; each of them would do anything for the other two. Even though she knew this, Callie always felt useless; she could never do anything about hollows and on top of that she couldn't even see them. She remembered how once Emily had confided how much That Night had scared her. She had told Callie that it made her realize how much William Bard's death had affected Claire. Callie had bit her tongue, she wanted to tell her to look in the mirror and realize how much it had affected her as well. Callie remembered well the two girls before the whole fiasco, they were smiling and happy. They were much more open and emotional. The whole ordeal had… hardened them both in a way; Callie questioned if either still remembered how to cry or show weakness. Callie wasn't blind though, she knew it had affected her too; she had become some what of the two girls', well, she didn't really know how to describe it. She had been the one to get Claire to snap out of it after William's death. She remembered how Claire had become obsessed with training and wasn't herself.

--Flash back—

_Callie slid open the door to reveal an empty space. She stormed through the small wooden building until she got to the two feet by two feet square of wood and lifted it up to reveal a ladder that reached down into a gray cement basement._

_"Callie, this might not be a good idea. Claire is fine, she's just still a bit depressed from well…" Emily's voice trailed off._

_"No, still depressed is okay. But it has been three months and she is basically an emotionless rock half the time. She needs to snap out of it." Callie said angrily. "And if you won't do something besides training with her, then I will." She preceded climbing down the ladder and Emily followed._

_They found Claire standing, propped up by her zanpakto, sweating and breathing hard. She looked up with slate-gray eyes and an emotionless face. Callie walked over and much to everyone's surprise, punched Claire hard in the face. Claire, who had already been just barely standing, fell back and landed with her arms behind her in sitting position. She reached up with one hand to touch her now-sore cheek. She didn't say anything though, just stared up with her slate-gray eyes and a now mildly shocked expression. Callie reached out a hand and grabbed the front of Claire's shirt and pulled her up then threw her back. Claire tried to steady herself._

_"Callie! You're going to far." Emily protested. Callie merely shook her head._

_"I don't care, I'll beat emotion out of her if I have to." She threw a kick at Claire who side stepped it but was still a bit to exhausted to do much more. Callie growled, "Wake. UP! Snap out of it and get over it!" She continued to attack. Gradually, bit-by-bit, Claire began to fight back. Her expression became angry._

_"What the hell are you attacking me for!?!" Claire finally roared. Callie smiled. Claire was back, if only slightly. She continued to fight._

_"What's the matter? Your voice not use to having emotion?" Callie taunted. Claire threw a kick, she was gaining pace and Callie knew that once she got her going that there was no way that she could keep up. "Hmm? You still don't get it? Figure it out. You've hardly done anything besides eat, sleep, school, and train."_

_Callie continued this for a while before simply stopping and leaving, but not before saying one last thing: "Think about it and get back to me when you've come in contact with sanity."_

--End Flash back—

Callie smiled a bit at the memory, it was probably one of the few times that she'd actually done something so… unlike her. She remembered how the next day, which happened to be a Saturday, Claire had showed up at her house asking if they could talk. Callie had let Claire in and they headed into Callie's bedroom. There they had just talked, there was no mention of the previous day, but it was understood that Claire had deserved it. After that she had continued to train, but she laid off of it a bit.

Callie soon found herself sleeping as well, leaning on Emily's shoulder and Emily leaning on Claire's. Cain continued to be absorbed in whatever video game he was playing.

Eventually the flight came to an end and it was dark out, according to Cain it was about 4 in the morning. Emily merely groaned at the thought and muttered something about 'ungodly hours' before falling back into a half-asleep state. They quickly found their luggage and walked into the crowded room that was the main part of the airport. There was a tall man with the same caramel-colored hair as Callie; he was probably about 6'2 and had thin rectangular glasses that went well with his thin, feminine face. When he saw the four teens he waved his hand and shouted.

_"Oi, idiots with the sleeping monkey!" _Jack Wood shouted at his little sister and her companions, he was joking of course. They weaved through the throng of people to where the 23 year-old stood. He was Callie's only sibling, but there was a huge ten-year age gap between the two. When they reached him Emily protested being called 'sleeping'.

_"I'm still awake, Jack." _Emily pointed out.

_"So you don't deny you're a monkey?" _Jack teased. Emily only groaned, as she was much to tired to argue with him now. _"Anyhow,"_ he said, now looking at Claire as well, _"Welcome back. I haven't seen either of you two in a while. Have you gotten taller?"_ Jacks attempts at small talk always sucked. He, like Callie, had a high reiatsu. He, unlike his sister, could see more than ghosts but this was all unknown to the three girls. Jack was completely aware of the fact that Claire was a shinigami and that Emily had certain abilities of her own. He also was aware of _what_ had killed William Bard.

_"No, I don't think I have. But yeah, the last time I saw you was almost a year and a half ago I think."_ Claire agreed. Jack was out of college and lived on his own as a journalist and aspiring author of fantasy novels for teens so he didn't come back home much even though he only lived an hour or so away.

_"Anyhow, I'm tired and I'm hungry. Let's go stop at a Taco Bell or something on our way home."_ Callie said. Jack smirked.

_"Yes, your royal annoying-ness."_ Jack teased and Callie just rolled her eyes. Emily had completely fallen asleep standing so Cain picked her up and threw both of their luggages on a cart and he grabbed it with one hand as he cradled his little sister in the other. Claire couldn't resist taking this moment to mock Cain.

_"Aww, how sweet. Sibling love."_ Claire snickered. Cain threw a glare in Claire's direction.

_"Shut up, Claire. Unless you want to try and carry her." _Was all he said. Claire still smirked and Callie and Jack had stifled their own snickers. It wasn't very often that Cain and Emily actually acted like they cared for each other.

The three girls ended up all staying at Callie's house, considering that was the closest of the three homes, and they dragged themselves up the stairs after being greeted by Callie's parents and immediately collapsed on the plush carpeting of her bedroom. None of them caring about the time or that hey would have to got to school tomorrow, although they would show up a bit late.

A/N: So what do you think? I'm hopping that the next chapter will be less… I don't know. Anyhow, I hope that this turned out okay! Please please please review!

(1)- Pirum (according to the online translation site I've been using) is Latin for pear. I know, it is a dumb name, but I needed to call it something.


	13. Pirum Academy

**The American Student**

A/N: Well, my birthday was not long ago so now I'm xxx years old (yeah, not telling. Giving you a hint I'm in middle school. Not saying anything more.) I got the Bleach DS game, and my parents weren't thrilled with the dialogue, as in the fact they swear _a lot_ during fights (especially Mayuri). I also got some manga and got to kidnap a friend and get sugar high at the mall with her so that was, err… well Fan-chan (her nickname, you can look her up as sasukestalker1 on FanFiction) is probably going to restrict my sugar intake when I'm not on my ADHD meds from now on. _**DOES ANYONE KNOW WHAT PROGRAM I NEED TO USE TO MAKE AN AMV AND WHERE TO GET A FREE TRIAL-DOWNLOAD OF IT?**_ Alright, I was just wondering and I really want to know, it must work with Windows 2000. Well I know nobody really cares much about author notes so here's chapter 13! Enjoy!

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach or anything else.**

See chapter two for font key.

Chapter Thirteen: Pirum Academy

Claire groaned as someone shook her. She was currently sprawled out on the floor of Callie's bedroom and she happened to want it to stay that way after how late she'd gotten to bed last night.

_"Oy, Claire. Up. Now."_ Cain said as he continuously nudged Claire with his foot. Claire muttered something that resembled _'shut up and let me sleep'_. He continued to shake her until he looked over to Jack who was trying to wake up Callie without much luck.

_"Jack, it's too early. Go away. __**Now.**__"_ Callie moaned. She was a morning person normally, but it was just too early considering the time they had gotten in the night before.

_"Mom said to get you up. She, Mrs. Lund, and Mrs. Bard all have decided you should just get into the swing of things again right away." _Jack explained.

_"Screw them, I WANT SLEEP." _Callie insisted.

_"Claire, up. I'm serious. Your parents are going to send you to school at the same time as usual. They want you to get used to our time zone again."_ Cain said. Claire finally opened her eyes and looked at Cain.

_"You have __**got**__ to be kidding me."_ Was all Claire said before she sat her self up and stretched. She noticed that Callie was sitting up now, too. Emily was nowhere in sight. _"Where's Emily?"_ Cain instantly smirked slightly and Claire got a bad feeling about it. Cain seemed like he wasn't going to answer so she got up and found her suitcase. She then headed to the bathroom with her toothbrush and brush in hand to get ready. Callie soon followed.

After the two girls were dressed, they headed downstairs to find a _very_ disgruntled Emily sitting at the kitchen table with a mug of coffee. Her hair looked like it had only been partly dried after getting wet and Claire had a sneaking suspicion as to how Emily had been woken up.

_"Morning girls." _Mr. Wood greeted them as they walked into the kitchen. He appeared to be finishing up a batch of pancakes.

_"Good morning Mr. Wood" _Claire answered. Callie gave a similar answer except for she substituted 'dad' for 'Mr. Wood'. They took their seats on either side of Emily.

_"How exactly did they wake you up?"_ Callie inquired. Emily frowned.

_"They threw me in your bathtub- with my clothes still on- while it was filled with ice cold water."_ Claire and Callie had a hard time not laughing. They figured that they would have to do something a bit odd to wake Emily up, but throwing her into the tub? That was a bit much…

After breakfast, the three girls were ready to go to school. They were all filled with caffeine, sugar, and pancakes so they would be able to hopefully stay awake. They headed out the door and took Callie's usual route to school. As they walked Claire couldn't help but feel glad to not have to be wearing a uniform. Instead, she was wearing a pair of her favorite dark-washed jeans and a navy blue polo shirt. She wore a pair of white tennis shoes and athletic socks. Oh, how she'd missed just wearing what she felt like to school. She had a light blue coat on because it was a cold day, much different from the temperatures had been in Japan.

Emily was too tired and still irked from her rude awakening to feel glad about wearing her normal clothes. She wore a pair of medium blue jeans and a black My Chemical Romance short-sleeved shirt under her denim jacket. She was of course wearing bright green socks with the same tennis shoes she'd shown up to Karakura High in.

Callie had just thrown on the school's uniform and a jacket. She was completely thrilled just to be with her friends again. She had a backpack slung over one shoulder and her clarinet was tucked nicely into it. She looked over at Claire, who she knew had her piano music in her messenger bag. She then looked at Emily, who was holding her small jet-black, sticker-decorated flute case in her left hand. They all had their first, second, and third hours together; expression (an odd-ball elective only Pirum would have), band, and English. Expression might as well have been a free period because it was basically just everyone writing about or talking about a topic the teacher chose, they never got their writing graded, though. The class was graded pretty much on whether or not you showed up actually, which a few chose to not.

When they arrived at the large, four-storied school they headed straight for the doors that were closest to their lockers. They quickly threw on their IDs and entered. From there they spread out to get to their lockers.

They rushed up room 302, the expression classroom. They took a seat on the rug, there were no desks or tables in this classroom. Emily attempted to sleep, but that didn't last long because as soon as other students realized they were back they greeted them and bombarded them with questions.

_"How was Japan?"_ was asked by a boy with dark-brown skin and curly hair whose name they knew was Mike.

_"It was okay. We had to wear uniforms all the time, though, at school."_ Claire answered drowsily.

_"Why are you back so soon? I thought you were going to be there longer."_ They were asked by an extremely petit blond named Kat.

_"'Cause Hana got hurt."_ Emily answered with a yawn; she realized that she would get no sleep. More questions were asked before the teacher finally rushed in. She only took a moment before noticing that Callie had brought back Emily and Claire.

_"Ah, Claire! Emily! I heard you were going to join us again for a while."_ Mrs. Finch said happily. _"How did you like Japan?"_ But before either could answer she came up with an idea. _"How about today we each ask you a question about Japan! We could learn about your stay that way!" _Claire sighed and Emily was half-asleep; once Mrs. Finch got an idea you couldn't tell her no. Claire nodded and shook Emily a bit until she was completely conscious.

_"I'll start. How did you interact with the students in Japan before Emily came? And then how did you both interact with them when you were both there?"_ Mrs. Finch asked excitedly.

_"Err… Well before Emily got there I ate lunch with a few of the other students, I actually was taller than a lot of them. On my first school night I ate dinner with a classmate because her apartment was right next to mine." _Claire answered. She then poked Emily to signal to give her the answer to the second question.

_"Well, once I arrived we pretty much acted the same around them sort of as we do around here. We tried the karate club once, too."_ Both girls smirked a bit at the memory of all those spars.

_"Next, hmm… Tom, you can ask the next one." _Mrs. Finch instructed. Tom scrunched his face for a moment in thought before asking.

_"How was the food?"_ Claire and Emily looked at him and then answered with a favorite of theirs.

_"Food-like."_ They said in unison. Tom rolled his eyes and the person next to him asked the next question. After that the next person asked a question and so on. This lasted all of class.

Next they headed to their lockers and met up at the band door. They stepped inside. Again they were greeted with a few questions and Fred, their band instructor who preferred to be referred to by his first name, merely smiled at them and nodded at first. They all headed to their seats in their rows that were organized by instrument. Claire sat off to the side where the keyboard was. After attendance Fred spoke more.

_"Well I'm glad to see that Japan decided to give me back my pianist for a bit."_ He joked. Claire was the only pianist for band and orchestra.

_"What? Aren't you glad Japan gave back one of you flute players?"_ Emily joked.

Fred looked as if he were in deep thought for a moment, _"Naw, they can have you back."_ He smiled to show he was joking.

Band class was always fun, they got to play recent music from fun things. One of the songs they were working on was One Winged Angel from Final FantasyVII, which they worked with the orchestra to play. They also played music from Avenue Q, The Nightmare Before Christmas, and Wicked. It was nice to play that sort of stuff during band.

At that moment they were playing the beginning notes of One Winged Angel, Claire's favorite to play. She had enjoyed the music for the game more than the game itself, actually. When she heard the notes she got rapped up in it, like she was only partially there. This was the reason Emily had brought Claire's sheet music to Japan with her.

The rest of band went smoothly and they made it to their English class without incident (okay, their was a fight in the hallway that they had to work around, but that was normal). When they got into English, though, Mrs. Willings was not happy with a certain student.

_"Emily, why exactly did you choose to take every core class here except for mine while you were in Japan?"_ Yeah, no hello or take your seat from Mrs. Louisa Willings, you generally either got silence or an interrogation.

_"Because Japan's English class is easier than yours."_ Emily answered truthfully, _"Especially since I already speak English."_

Claire decided to save her friend and grabbed Emily's arm to drag her to a seat in the back row to save her from their teacher's wrath. Honestly, sometimes her friend had no common sense.

"Nice idea, telling her you think Japan's English classes are easier. You do realize you're going to regret that, right?" Claire asked in low voice, saying it in Japanese just so they wouldn't deal with any eavesdropping the teacher was doing from 5 feet away.

Emily looked confused, "What'd I say?" Claire just shook her head, this was why Mrs. Willings didn't like Emily, she never knew when to shut up sometimes. Mrs. Willings shot a look back at Claire, Emily, and Cally (who had sat down on Emily's right and was hiding her smile at her friend's actions) before heading to the front of the rows and beginning to ramble on about some old author; Claire couldn't care less.

_Alright, I expect us to be in America for a week at least. When we get back to Japan I expect for the shinigami to have probably snuck into the apartment to inspect it to see what they can find,_ Claire thought; she went through a mental checklist of what they had left in the apartment, _…some clothes, Emily's hair dye, a pocket knife… oh shit! _Claire's expression twitched ever so slightly as she realized one thing that they'd left. _And the picture Will had taken of my seal after he'd finished it…_ She couldn't believe she'd left that. She wanted to slap her forehead with her palm; if they found that she would have some questions to answer when she got back. _Please don't let them check that drawer, please don't let them open it…_

In Japan…

"Okay, how are we going to get in?" Renji asked as he tried the doorknob for the fifth time. They were all in shinigami-form so that they wouldn't be seen. Hitsugaya recalled everything he knew about Orihime's apartment, knowing that Claire's was the mirror image, and tried to think of any way they could get in.

"The window- the lock is annoying to use so they might not have used it," Hitsugaya reasoned. He condensed some random reishi (1) and moved to the window quickly. He pushed on it and, much to his happiness, it opened easily. He slid in and walked up to the door and unlocked it to let Matsumoto, Rukia, and Renji in.

"You know, it doesn't feel right doing this… breaking into their home," Matsumoto admitted as she walked in. Rukia nodded in agreement and Renji seemed to agree with Hitsugaya on the fact that they _needed_ to know exactly what was going on with Claire and Emily. Hitsugaya headed for the bathroom and Matsumoto cut him off. "I'll look in there. Rukia can go look in their bedroom," Hitsugaya seemed baffled.

"Why does it matter?"

"Because just like a girl needs to shop, they also deserve some degree of privacy. Letting boys into their bedroom and bathroom would be wrong, Taicho," Matsumoto stated firmly. Hitsugaya rolled his eyes and sighed, and Rukia went into the bedroom. Renji was searching through the kitchen so Hitsugaya shuffled through the stuff left in the main entrance area, careful not to make anything noticeably moved. He found some boxes of pocky, a pen, and some other typical things. He came to a document that was written in Japanese so he read it.

It said the following:

Bard Claire:

It has been a month since your arrival in Japan, you have kept up in your new classes fairly well, but there has been some notice of your interaction in after school activities involving the school; you aren't involved in any. When this was reported to the American Education People they expressed that they would like you and Lund Emily to possibly take a part in a club or, and this seems like something possibly enjoyable, attend the dance that is going to be held in early November. They do not wish to stunt your social growth even if you are away from home, so it is recommended that you do make some friends.

-The Japanese Board of Education

Hitsugaya reread the letter again; he was now sure that Claire had actually just been told that she needed to make some friends. He slid the paper back into its original place and continued to poke around.

In the bathroom, Matsumoto was going through another drawer. So far she had only found the usual stuff that you would expect to be in a bathroom that belonged to two thirteen-year-old girls. At least, it was normal until she found a small bottle of pills. It was written in English but she could make out Emily's name on the bottle and a number: 30. She left the bathroom and showed it to Hitsugaya.

"It looks like some sort of prescription, knowing them it is probably pain meds," Hitsugaya concluded. Matsumoto nodded and put it back where she found it.

In the kitchen, Renji was staring into the cupboard he had just opened. There had to have been _at least_ twelve boxes of Easy Mac. So far he had seen lots of pop, a gallon of milk, some sort of sugary chocolate cereal, utensils, dishes, and Easy Mac. Oh, and he had found some coffee, tea, a microwave, and a coffee maker. But that amount of

Easy Mac, _Is this all they eat for dinner?_, Renji wondered.

Rukia wasn't having much more luck than Renji. The bedroom had been completely normal so far; not a single suspicious item. She knelt down and opened the bottom drawer in the dresser, the last thing to check. She saw some socks and underwear that had apparently been left behind. She was about to close the drawer when she saw a piece of paper. She reached in and grabbed it and felt that it was a photo. She flipped it over and nearly dropped it from surprise.

"Uh, Hitsugaya-taicho, I think I found something you'll want to see…"

In America during lunch…

_"You left __**what**__?!?" _Emily and Callie exclaimed in unison. Claire just shook her head slightly and put her head in her palm.

_"And they will probably break in, I hope we locked the window…"_ Claire said. Emily looked a bit shocked.

_"Claire, the lock on the window…I didn't lock it. You didn't either, did you?"_ Claire actually did hit her head with her palm—she hadn't locked it. Callie wasn't sure whether or not her friends were idiots or just _very_ unlucky. The rest of lunch was pretty much small talk, with the knowledge of what might happen looming over them like one big annoying cloud of impending doom. Although it wasn't exactly doom they'd face… More like an interrogation where the interrogators had actual evidence.

In Japan…

"What is it, Kuchiki?" Hitsugaya had just entered the bedroom and wondered what the other shinigami had found in her search. Rukia stood up and handed the picture to Hitsugaya. He looked at the picture and both eyebrows raised slightly.

"That was the mark I saw on Bard," Rukia stopped for a second, "There is a small difference in the two marks, though."

"Difference? What?" Hitsugaya wondered.

"The small numbers surrounding the flower in the middle are different," She answered. Hitsugaya looked up, he had a serious yet triumphant expression.

"It has to be a seal, I can't think of anything else," Hitsugaya confirmed, "Oy, Abarai, Matsumoto! Get in here!" The two fukutaichos(2) entered the room and Hitsugaya showed them the picture as soon as they were close enough.

"Is this-" Renji was cut off.

"Yes. The numbers have changed, though." Hitsugaya said before Renji could finish his question. They looked a bit surprised. It really _was_ the tenth division's mark. For a while they studied the photo and then when it had gotten late they put the photo back as close as to its original position as they could.

Back in America, school had ended for the day and they were now headed to the hospital that Hana was staying at. When they got there they opened the door to her room to see Hana lying down with only a broken arm and leg.

_"I thought you said she had a broken rib."_ Claire whispered to Callie.

_"I was kidding, she does have quite a few bruises, though."_ Callie said. Claire gave Callie an unhappy glare and headed over to Hana.

_"Nice to see you're not dead, shorty!"_ Emily said teasingly. Hana sent what could have easily been interpreted as a glare in Emily's direction.

_"Nice to see you didn't get food poisoning, idiot."_ Hana retorted. Claire put her head in one hand, _here they go again… _

For the next fifteen minutes Claire and Callie listened to Emily and Hana throw insults back and forth until finally they shut up. Claire and Callie started talking with Hana and overall the visit was nice. America would definitely be a nice break from Japan.

A/N: I know, ending wasn't so good but I've become extremely distracted by Yellowcard music (especially Cut Me, Mick) and also I'm trying to do other things at once as well. Please review! Also, if anyone has some knowledge of Japanese (enough to give a zanpakto a half-decently translated name) then I would _**REALLY **_appreciate some help (as long as you don't mind slight spoilers for the fic).

(1)- reishi is I believe the term for the random spirit particles that soul society is made up of and that also exists in the real world, it is what makes up Ishida's bow and arrow.

(2)- fukutaicho I _think_ (I'm not 100 percent sure) is the term for vice-captain. That's what it sounds like so…


	14. Back in Japan

**The American Student**

A/N: So I'm typing this only a few days after ch13 was posted, let's see how long it takes me to post it. Well I'm glad I got reviews! That always motivates me… Oh, and if anyone cares to help, I need to know if adjective adjective noun(2 words) and leaving it just that way with no other words would be correct in Japanese because I have all the words but I don't know if just saying them in the way we would say them in English would be correct or not. Here's chapter 14!

Also, I put a link on my profile to a picture of what I think of for how Claire's seal looks, it's at the bottom so look at it if you want.

Merry Christmas! (Sorry to those of you who don't celebrate Christmas)

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

See chapter two for font key.

Chapter Fourteen: Back in Japan

Claire and Emily had only been in America a week and they already had to go back to Japan. It was a Monday and they had skipped school that day to make sure they had everything.

Callie stood in the airport terminal with Cain and Jack; they had just finished saying goodbye to Emily and Claire. None of their parents could come, of course; they were always busy.

On the plane, Emily and Claire took their seats. The plane was pretty empty so they got their own row. Claire and Emily both were listening to their MP3 players as the plane took off. After that meeting with the American Education People, all Claire and Emily wanted to do was drown out everything else with their music.

--Flashback—

_"So I assume you got the letter regarding your school-related activities,"_ Connie Foster, the head of the project that sent Claire to Japan, said. Claire and Emily both nodded. _"So you understand that we do expect you to go to that dance, right?" _

_"Yes, we understand that, although I don't understand why it is necessary,"_ Claire answered. It was now Ernest Crownings that spoke up.

_"Because we feel it is necessary for you to have some positive social experiences while you are in Japan,"_ he said. Claire sighed and nodded.

--End Flashback—

All Claire wanted to hear now was the sweet sound of Yellowcard.

_Someplace, somewhere behind me,  
I walked right through the truth.  
Truth is that you're the one thing,  
That always pulls me through.(1)_

Ah, yes. The wonderful sound of rock bands, she could just drown the thoughts of all the horrors of a dance in it- cranked up loud enough that Emily could have heard it if her volume wasn't cranked up just as loud, if not louder.

Emily's eyes were closed, her iPod was turned up loud enough to make any sort of comprehensible thought impossible; just the way she liked it when something so horrible as a dance was coming up. She let the lyrics cancel out anything else around her.

_As far as I can tell  
It's just voices in my head  
Am I talking to myself?  
'Cause I don't know what I just said (2)_

To any other person on the plane, it looked as if the girls were sleeping; actually, they were concentrating so hard on the lyrics that it would be a miracle if either one even touched the boundaries of unconciousness.

They were truly dreading the dance for a few reasons. The first reason was that they both hated drssing up, on top of that they had nothing to wear so they would have to go clothes shopping, something they both disliked. Neither one liked the feel of wearing a skirt or dress and wearing either made it hard to fight if a hollow were to show up- another reason for not enjoying their scholl uniforms.

The second reason is that neither one of them liked wearing any sort of maekup which is exactly what their moms had told them to wear as soon as they'd heard about the dance; they were thrilled and had begun tossing out every type and brand of makeup they could think of that they should wear. Mrs. Bard and Mrs. Lund would be lucky if their daughters wore lipgloss- the only thing they wore on a daily basis was chapstick and Emily wore some makeup for a scar. And once again, they owned none so they would have to go shopping for it.

The third, and in their opinion the worst thing about dances, was that they had to dance. They both knew that that was the whole point of dances, but neither girl enjoyed it at all. They could dance, that was true, but they didn't like it one bit. Besides, in there opinion there was better things to do than waste time in crowded gyms where the most there was to do was either dance, chat, or be bored. At least, that was how it was at Pirum.

As both girls drowned out all other thought, Hitsugaya was consentrating on those same two girls. He was pacing back and forth in the back room of the Urahara Shoten, surrounded by most of the other shinigami, Ichigo wasn't there.

"So we** know **that she does have some sort of seal, mostlikely multiple because of the changing numbers- they're probably counters of some sort," Hitsugaya said to nobody in particular.

"We also know that they seem to live off of pocky and instant macaroni and cheese, but we have no proof that we know all of this unless we admit that we snuck into their apartment," Renji said from his place on the floor, "None of it does us any good for the time being."

Hitsugaya nodded in agreement and stopped pacing. He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair, "Either those two really know what they are doing or they are really lucky," He didn't know how else they could be able to keep a whole group of shinigami from finding useful proof. Ever since Claire came, it was obvious that something was off about her, but proof was never there. And now as soon as they had seen proof, they couldn't use it as proof. As long as Claire said she wasn't lying, Hitsugaya had very little that he could do.

The room was quiet except for the sound of Hitsugaya pacing; they all were at a loss for what to do. After awhile they all left, deciding they wouldn't get anywhere for the time being.

Elsewhere, Claire and Emily were still drowning out every thing with the music when they realized that the plane was landing. They quickly packed away their MP3 players as the plane landed gracefully. The two exited the plane without any problems and found their luggage. Then they realized some thing- they had no way of making it to the apartment because they had no clue as to what bus to take.

_"We probably should have thought of this,"_ Emily said as it dawned on her. Claire let out a drawn out breath. Nakamoto was probably busy and she didn't want to bother him. Then she saw the sign that advertised the airport's free Wi-Fi connection. She immediately dug out her laptop and turned it on. Emily watched her do so.

_"What are you doing?"_

_"Getting online to try and get a bus schedual,"_ She quickly entered her password for her user ID on her laptop and as soon as it loaded she clicked on the internet explorer button. She connected to the Wi-Fi by following the directions on the sign and then a message appeared.

_To display the following characters correctly you need to install the following language pack:_

_Japanese_

Claire actually glared at the computer screen. Anytime she ever got that message, her computer froze. And sure enough, when Claire tried to move her mouse and click 'X', the cursor wouldn't budge. Emily looked at the screen- she knew they were stuck.

_"Maybe we should just call him. Besides, it is only about five P.M. right now,"_ Claire seemed to weigh the pros and cons of calling him when he might be busy. Finally, she nodded and began dialing. After a few moments he must have picked up because Claire began talking. The conversation lasted a minute or two and then she closed the phone.

_"He says that we should take bus eight-A unitl it stops near our school,"_ Claire informed Emily. Emily grabbed her bags and followed Claire towards the bus area. The airport was fairly crowded, crawling with people trying to get to their destination. The two girls rushed on; Nakamoto had said that the bus would leave in a few minutes.

They had managed to make it to the bus and find a seat in time so that they wouldn't have to wait for the next one. There weren't too many people on this bus so they didn't have to worry about room for their luggage. It was also mildly quiet, almost creepy.

Rukia climbed in through the window in Ichigo's bedroom. He was sitting at the desk doing what she assumed was homework. He glanced up when she landed with a soft thud on his bed.

"We got nowhere," Rukia said.

"I don't really see why it matters," He looked up from his paper as he said this. He just didn't see why it really mattered if Claire was a shinigami or not. On the other hand, his thinking was that of someone who also had not obtained his powers in a normal way and it was this that probably made him less bothered by the possibility. In his opinion, whether Claire was a shinigami or not was her business.

"Of course it matters, it… well…" Rukia herself couldn't find a reason why it mattered whether or not Claire was a shinigami, "it does matter." She said that as if that was all the reason needed. Ichigo was about to comment when there was a knock on the door.

"Ichi-nii, Yuzu made some cookies. Come down if you want some," Karin said through the door.

"Okay, I'll be down in a minute," Ichigo called back. He looked back at Rukia with an expression that said 'your reason isn't good enough' and headed down the stairs.

When Claire and Emily had been dropped off at the stop near Karakura High, they immediately started on their way to the apartment with all of their suitcases in hand. It didn't take long to get there and when they opened the door, the first thing they did was search for evidence of someone having entered the place. They had to admit, they did a pretty good job of covering their trail. There was one flaw: the picture of Claire's seal was slightly out of place.

_"Oy, Em, look,"_ Claire said as Emily walked into the bedroom. Emily sighed, so they had found the picture.

_"Greeaat…just perfect,"_ Emily voice dripped with annoyance. This was the _last_ thing they needed them to have seen. The one time they leave for an extended period of time and _this_ happens. Claire just sort of shrugged her shoulders and put the picture back in its place. She had already figured this would happen, _what can go wrong, will go wrong._

The next day, the two girls headed off towards school. They had both decided that if any of the shinigami tried to use facts against them that they would have only been able to gather by being in their apartment, they would 'calmly' remind them that breaking and entering is illegal no matter how you look at it.

When they plopped down into their seats Emily immediately dozed off and Claire looked past her friend and out the window. It was cold out, enough that they had to wear their winter uniforms. This peace didn't last long, though. Hitsugaya soon showed up followed by Matsumoto.

"Bard-san, Lund-san, you're back," Matsumoto observed. She sounded a bit happy and Claire nodded and smiled.

"Yeah, we got back yesterday after school," Claire said. Hitsugaya was not exactly thrilled to see the two girls back as he sat down in his seat next to Claire. Orihime and Tatsuki came in not long after.

"Lund-san, Claire-san, when did you get back?" Orihime asked when she saw Claire and the snoozing Emily, who had not awoken even after her name being said twice.

"Just yesterday. What did I miss while we were gone?"

"Hmm… nothing much really. You were getting your work e-mailed to you, right?" Claire nodded, "so then the only thing you missed is that the school is going to have a dance in a little over a week," Claire flinched slightly at the mention of it.

"Yeah, I've already heard about the dance," Claire said smiling but through slightly clenched teeth. Emily had lifted her head at the mention of the dance and was equally displeased.

"Oh, you did? Are you going? I sounded like fun!" Orihime asked excitedly.

"Unfortunately yes. Emily and I are sort of being forced to," Claire responded through her still slightly clenched teeth and the smile was gone.

"Forced?" Matsumoto asked.

"Yeah, American Education People don't think we're 'involved with enough social activities' here," Emily answered for Claire. She was not in a good mood after the discovery of Claire's photo out of place. Her voice was a bit flat and oozed with a distinct don't-even-dare-piss-me-off feel. When she had spoken she had even made the air quotes with her fingers around the words 'involved with enough social activities', something she hardly ever did. She had stayed up _way_ to late last night and that combined with everything else had put her in this fowl mood; even caffeine couldn't have made her any more pleasant.

"Well it sounds like fun so we should all go together!" Orihime said enthusiastically. Matsumoto looked delighted.

"Oooh! And we can all go shopping too!" Matsumoto was absolutely thrilled at the thought, Claire and Emily weren't.

"Oh goodie, a shopping trip," Emily remarked sarcastically. Claire was just about as against it as Emily, but she saw the happy look on Orihime's face and she didn't want to be mean. She would have to go shopping anyhow, why not go with a group of people?

"Fine, we'll go," Claire said. Emily looked at Claire with confused eyes.

_"We will?"_ She asked. Claire nodded.

_"We'll have to go shopping anyhow, might as well go with a group,"_ Claire explained. Emily sighed.

_"Fine, but we are not buying anything frilly."_

_"Duh."_ Claire answered.

They realized that class was getting ready to start so everyone took their seats.

Class seemed to have passed excruciatingly slow, like every second was a minute. Claire and Emily assumed this was because neither one wanted to hear the interrogation that was bound to come at lunch; they rather just get it over with. It seemed to have been a whole day already when lunch came and the two girls sat down. As expected, Hitsugaya came to sit with them, but he didn't even get to sit down before Claire and Emily were yanked off the ground and quickly dragged down the stairs and to out side the school.

When they were released, they once again found themselves in the company of the same girls they had eaten lunch with the last time they had been dragged here. And also like last time, it was Tatsuki and Orihime that had dragged them there.

"Alright, why did we get dragged here?" Emily asked, clearly still in a bad mood but a bit more pleasant than before. "And don't even use the 'because you looked lonely' excuse." She looked around and only had to wait a moment for a reason.

"Because we need to plan our shopping trip," Matsumoto answered, apparently she'd abandoned her taicho to plan. Emily moaned slightly in displeasure and Claire sighed.

"What's there to plan? All we need to do is set a day and from there we just go to different shops," Claire said.

"What?!? There's much more than that! We need to plan what shops to go to, what we need to buy, everything," Matsumoto stated, "This is serious business." Both thirteen-year-olds sweat-dropped at that last statement.

"Well, what day should we go is what we should figure out first," Tatsuki said, who apparently was also going because of Orihime.

"Hmm… how about this Sunday? October twenty-first," Orihime suggested. The color in Claire's face immediately drained out a bit. Emily's expression hardened at the mention of that date also- the day William Bard died.

"Let's go after school Saturday instead. Sunday is a bad day," Claire said in a completely composed voice. Orihime had noticed their reactions, but didn't ask.

"Okay, Saturday it is! Right after school!" She said in her cheerful voice.

"My Hime-chan is so cute!"

Thud.

"OWW!!!"

"Hey! My sushi!"

They all watched the domino effect of how when Chizuru had leaped up and then kicked down, knocking into someone else who then also crashed into someone else, etc… Eventually the tumble had ended when Claire wound up crashing into Emily and (bum bum bum…) destroyed Emily's box of pocky in the process.

Emily's eyebrow twitched, _"Claire…"_ Twitch. Twitch.

Claire jumped up at the same time as Emily lunged to grab Claire's pocky as a substitute for her lost one. Claire got to it first and dashed away. The two girls began to spar as Claire attempted to keep her pocky and Emily tried to steal it from her grasp.

Even though Emily was in a bad mood, both girls were smiling as they dodged hits and exchanged blows; they hadn't sparred just for fun in a while. Emily threw out a kick to set Claire off-balance, but failed as she ducked down and swept her own leg out and tripped Emily who then immediately threw one hand back to rotate herself back to her feet before her torso hit; the whole time making grabs for the small red box or Claire trying to keep it.

From the sidelines, the other girls watched the exchange with a mix of amusement and slight awe at their movements.

The fight ended when Emily threw a punch dangerously close to Claire's head at the same time Claire kneed Emily in the gut. At that minute both girls each took a step back to catch their breath.

_"Fine, keep that box but you owe me __**two**__ later,"_ Emily said, still smiling- bad mood now mostly gone after their fun. She even held up two fingers to emphasize the number.

_"Deal."_ Claire agreed as she wiped a bit of blood away from the side of her face where one of Emily's blows had just _barely_ nicked her. Over all, each girl was in pretty good condition except for a few scratched here and there. They both knew each other too well for them to be really injured from a play fight; one that left them breathing fairly close to normal, only slightly out of breath.

They moved back to where they were sitting before.

_"Remember, two boxes,"_ Emily reminded. Claire sighed and nodded; her friend could be as annoying as heck but they were friends even if they fought over boxes of candy a lot.

A/N: This was definitely a transition chapter- not much action. I'm sorry about that, it was definitely not one of my best but it was necessary. I hope you all liked it, please review!!!

**READ THIS: I honestly need to think of AIM screen names for Emily, Claire, and Callie. I cannot think of any and I need to for the next chapter. Please leave a review with any ideas for them labeled with what character it is for. THANK YOU IF YOU DO!!!**

Footnotes:

(1)- The song Claire was listening to was 'Cut Me, Mick' by Yellowcard. I just used it because I like the song.

(2)- The song Emily was listening to was 'Walking Disaster' by Sum 41. I also really like this song so I used it.


	15. Shopping

The American Student

**MY INTERNET LIVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!! **

**As most of you know, I was having some internet account issues, but that's all fixed up now because my wonderful dad reset our modem and our internet provider stopped being an idiot (for now). Hopefully, I can update The American Student again soon, but school and attention span dictates this mostly. Sorry for the delay.**

A/N: Sorry this took me so long! School has kept me really tied up along with the fact that I started a fic for the book _Twilight_. I also got really bored on one of the many snow days my school district has had recently and started writing an original story for the heck of it. In addition to that, I've sort of half-lost inspiration for this story right now, but I'm trying to get it back (blame the snow days!). Thanks so much to those of you who reviewed and left suggestions for the screen names! I think this is a really slow chapter, a bit rough actually, but I hope that I can get into stride the next chapter.

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

WARNING: IM style talking ahead- sorry for those of you who don't like it, but I thought it would be better. **Also, this chapter is definitely a bit sucky.**

See chapter two for font key.

Chapter Fifteen: Shopping

Claire and Emily knew this had been coming, but they hadn't expected it this early in the morning. They had just sat down in the classroom and Emily was about to drop her head when Hitsugaya started the interrogation.

"So why did you leave Japan?" The white haired chibi-taicho asked from his seat next to Claire.

"None of your business," Claire answered coolly.

"Why is it none of my business? It's just a simple question, after all."

"Why are you asking why I answered that way? You remind me of a little kid when you do that," Claire retorted, "On the other hand, it would make sense if your interrogation tactics fit your appearance, midget." Hitsugaya turned slightly red out of frustration. Was there nothing that could make this girl break?

"Do you have anything to say about the mark on your neck?"

"Nope. You have anything to say about your hair?" Hitsugaya didn't respond. He got the feeling that this wasn't going anywhere so he stopped talking. Emily was half-awake at her desk and smirking slightly.

_Well,_ Claire thought with a smirk very similar to Emily's, _that takes care of the interrogation_.

---AIM Conversation Friday Night---

**pockyfan01:** u know, I didn't think AIM would work in Japan…

**ghostbuster9:** y?

**pockyfan01:** bcuz the 'A' is for America

**ghostbuster9: **good point… hey, y are we IM-ing when we r in the same room?

**pockyfan01:** don't know

**pockyfan01:** hey, Callie just logged in

**pockyfan01: **give me a sec, I'll send an invite

**ghostbuster9:** k

--At that point, Emily formed a new chat room for all three of them.

**pockyfan01 has joined the chat room.**

**ghostbuster9 has joined the chat room.**

**ChocolateFiend185 has joined the chat room.**

**pockyfan01:** Callie, I don't even want to know what ungodly hour it is in the US that you are awake at

**ChocolateFiend185:** ungodly? it's only about 6AM

**pockyfan01:** morning person

**ChocolateFiend185:** yep, and proud of it

**ghostbuster9:** so what r u doing?

**ChocoalteFiend185:** watching the weather channel, IM-ing you two, and waiting for my Lean Pockets style breakfast to finish heating up in the microwave. What about u?

**pockyfan01:** hmm… plotting world domination?

**ghostbuster9:** waiting for my Easy Mac to finish in the microwave and IM-ing you.

**ChocolateFiend185:** I don't believe the world domination, I do believe that you two are probably living off instant macaroni and cheese

**ghostbuster9:** yep, although I think Emily might have some sort of evil plan brewing…

**pockyfan01: **muwahaha

**ChocolateFiend185:** so what r u guys doing on your day off?

**ghostbuster9: **well, nothing Sunday, but we're going bum, bum, bummmmm shopping (unfortunately) tomorrow after school. We have a dance that we r sort of being forced to attend.

**ChocolateFiend185:** oh, yeah… I remember you saying something about that… have fun.

And the rest of their conversation consisted of much teasing, Callie trying to convince them to buy dresses actually, and then Claire and Emily completely refusing- but eventually they caved. What scared them was that these were Callie's last words of the conversation:

**ChocolateFiend185:** I think I'll give u a call while u r shopping… bye.

**ChocolateFiend185 has signed off. They will receive your IMs when they log back in. **

It was enough to send shivers down their spines.

---Saturday---

Claire and Emily dragged themselves to school; they were both dreading what was to happen after school today. Shopping. They were both absolutely dreading that experience. Honestly, who wants to be dragged around a mall for something besides book shopping? Their parents normally had to bribe them to get out of the bookstore and into the clothing store. The whole thing was ridiculous, but Claire had figured that it would be better going as a group than just the two of them.

When the two of them sat down they were bombarded by Orihime and Rangiku; asking them where they wanted to go first, where they wanted to eat at, and the like.

"I don't care, I just need to buy an outfit," Claire answered unenthusiastically.

"Okay then, we'll make it a surprise!" Orihime declared happily. Claire sighed, mildly afraid of where they would go. Emily had decided to ignore them and sleep, and Claire was now thankful that her friend wasn't awake enough to hear them.

Class passed far to quick for Claire to be happy, every part of the day had just flown by so now they were leaving school. Claire, Emily, Orihime, Matsumoto, Tatsuki, and, of course because her Hime-chan was going, Chizuru came as well. So the six of them were going to swing by Orihime and Claire's apartments really quick because they were all going to dump off their school bags in Orihime's apartment and Claire and Emily were going to change clothes fast.

They soon arrived at the apartment building and four of them went into Orihime's apartment while Claire and Emily went into theirs. They quickly rejoined them outside the building, Claire and Emily now both wearing jeans and long-sleeves. Emily's was a faded black shirt with 'Linkin Park' written on it in grey. She had a denim jacket thrown on top to keep her warm and she still had her green messenger bag with her.

Claire had thrown on a white shirt with a black polo over it (the polo was so that her seal was covered by the collar). She had a gray fall jacket thrown on and, like Emily, had her khaki messenger bag slung across her torso.

"So where are we going shopping at?" Claire wondered out loud. She had left the decisions of where they were going up to the others.

"The mall, there are a variety of stores there so it will be easier to find something," Matsumoto sounded absolutely thrilled at the thought of all those stores. Honestly, it was beyond Claire why _anyone_ would be enthusiastic about shopping for clothes. She much preferred shopping for books to clothes because it didn't involve dressing rooms, too-tight shirts, not long enough pants, or clothes in general that you couldn't fight well in.

The group of girls moved through the streets, chattering the whole way. They all seemed enthusiastic about trying on different dresses and skirts, with the obvious exception of Emily and Claire. There was talk about various shops and styles, so eventually the youngest two stopped paying attention.

Before they realized it, Claire and Emily were already walking through the glass doors of the Karakura. The place looked huge- built much more open than their mall back home that was always so crowded that it appeared cramped on most days. Shoppers headed in every direction and Claire took a tiny step back, she already wanted to leave the place. Emily's face was clearly one of displeasure- she disliked shopping more than Claire did.

"_Let's just get this over with,"_ Emily muttered unhappily under her breath. Claire nodded just enough that Emily noticed. Orihime grabbed Claire by the wrist and Matsumoto grabbed Emily in a similar fashion and began to lead them to the first store.

The room they had just entered was bright colored, it definitely only sold girl's clothing, and it had very fashionable and most likely uncomfortable clothing covering almost every inch of the store. It was a pretty decent size and Claire could spot some stairs from here so it was obviously multi-leveled.

"Ah! I think the dresses are on the floor below us," Chizuru said. The group migrated towards the stairwell and headed down.

The next fifteen minutes were a complete blur to Emily and Claire- dresses were being handed off to others of that size and they probably went through about half the racks in the store before they finally went to the dressing rooms, loaded down with multiple random dresses that neither one was excited about trying on.

Claire threw on a bright-blue dress that came down to just above her knee. It had a band of darker blue lace at her waist that divided the satin dress into two parts. The spaghetti straps were also made of dark blue, but still of a satin-like fabric. Then she heard some familiar music.

_"I think I'm drowning _

_asphyxiated._

_I wanna break this spell_

_that you've created."_

_"Em, isn't that your phone?"_ Claire asked loudly of the occupant of the dressing room stall next to her.

_"Yeah, I'm digging it out now,"_ Emily replied. Claire could hear the shuffling of Emily digging her phone out of her bag. The ring continued and everyone now could hear the first two verses of "Time Is Running Out" by Muse.

"_You're something beautiful_

_a contradiction._

_I wanna play the game_

_I want the friction."_

The music suddenly shut off, _"Uh-oh. Looks like Callie is planning on making sure of what we buy. It's a text."_

_"You've got to be kidding me… What does it say? Pass me your phone,"_ Claire asked from her stall as she tried on another dress. A hand reached over the stall holding a silver Motorola RAZR. She looked at it in horror. It read the following:

_Callie: Alright, since I know you 2 will make excuses so that you won't have to buy dresses, I've got a plan. Take pictures of the dresses as you try them on and send them to me, I'll help you choose and at the same time make sure that you actually buy a dress. You WILL buy dresses… you'd both just look so cute in them!_

_"She has got to be joking,"_ Claire said as she and Emily both stepped out of their stalls in dresses to discuss the issue. Callie, they both knew, was serious about this; she _would_ make them buy dresses even if she was on another continent. Callie didn't take shopping lightly, and the chance to put her two anti-shopping friends in dresses was just too good to resist.

Emily sighed, _"I don't think she is. Want to just give in now and save ourselves from her wrath?"_ There are few people that could make Emily and Claire give in easily, and their friend was one of them when it came to shopping. Claire seemed to think it over and nodded, clearly defeated by the prospect of Callie being denied seeing them in dresses- it wasn't pretty. So Emily took her phone back from Claire and responded with a "sure".

"What do you think?" Both girls turned their heads to see Orihime in a light pink dress standing in the middle of the dressing room area.

"It looks nice," Claire answered truthfully; she had found a nice dress fast. Emily nodded in agreement, as she looked at the older girl.

"Thanks! I think I do like this one," Orihime responded happily.

"You should get it then! It's even on sale!" Matsumoto encouraged as she stepped out in her own dress, which happened to be extremely low-cut.

"I think I will. Hey, are those the dresses you two are going to buy?" Orihime asked curiously.

"Maybe," Emily answered as she took a picture of what Claire was wearing so she could send it to Callie.

"Still undecided, then?" Tatsuki asked from her seat on a bench.

"Oh, Tatsuki-chan, you already found one?" Orihime questioned as she saw the dress in Tatsuki's arms.

"Yeah, it fit so I figured I'd buy it. It's not that expensive," She shrugged. She was only a bit more willing than Emily or Claire to be shopping.

"My Hime-chan looks so cute!" Chizuru squealed as she seemed to come out of nowhere in a dress as she leaped towards the redhead and was quickly kicked down by Tatsuki.

"Chizuru, that looks good on you," Rangiku observed as the girl stood up from the floor.

"Thanks. I'm going to keep looking, though," And with that, more dress shopping pursued. To Emily and Claire's relief, nobody asked about why they were taking so many pictures.

An hour and what seemed like fifty dresses later, they were set. Callie had finally approved a dress for Emily and one for Claire after going through various stores as the six girls had traveled in search of dresses. Claire was still wearing the dark-blue, spaghetti-strapped dress that Callie had just sent a text approving and was looking at it one last time in the one hundred eighty degree mirror. In her opinion it was too short, it went down to the same part just above her knee as her uniform did, and it was too feminine with its satin-y texture and lacey trim.

"Hey, Bard-san, I didn't know you had a tattoo," Tatsuki said from behind the younger girl. Claire's hand flew up and covered the spot as she turned to face the boyish girl.

"Uh, um… yeah," Claire stuttered and Emily looked up from the manga she'd bought from a small bookstore they had passed. To their relief, Tatsuki didn't say anymore about the mark, to their displeasure the others had heard.

"Really? I want to see it!" Matsumoto said innocently, as if she hadn't already heard all about the "tattoo".

"Um, can you just forget about it? It's something I don't generally go around showing people," Claire asked nicely as she pulled her hair out of its ponytail so that it covered her seal.

"You actually have one?" Orihime asked, amazed that she actually had a tattoo like she'd heard from Rukia.

"Yeah, but I'd rather not talk about it. Uh…I think I'll just change out of this now so we can get going," She said hurriedly as she moved quickly towards the stall door. She changed fast, eager to cover herself up again with her jeans and polo. She stepped out of the dressing stall and slung her messenger bag across her torso before walking towards the nearby register.

"So where to now?" Emily asked.

"Food. There's a burger place over there in the food court," Matsumoto pointed out. They all moved towards the area pointed out and got their food. Once they had all sat down at a table, conversation began again.

"That was fun," Orihime said between bites of her special-order sandwich that had made the workers turn slightly green in the face.

"Yep. Wait 'til I show Taicho what I bought!" Matsumoto sounded absolutely thrilled at the thought of sharing what she'd purchased with her ever-adorable chibi-taicho.

"I'm sure he'll be thrilled," Emily smirked at the thought.

"What I can't wait for is the dance! Then I'll get to dance with my Hime- OW!" She suddenly shouted as Tatsuki seemed to scoot back in her chair again after kicking her. Claire smiled, shopping hadn't been as horrible as predicted, but still pretty bad. _Maybe,_ she thought, _I might even go if they invite Emily and me again, just for the heck of it._

"Oh! I forgot, there's a sale I wanted to go to while we're here!' Matsumoto suddenly announced.

_Or maybe not_.

A/N: Well, thanks for reading this crappy chapter! I hope to get back into stride as soon as I get through this slow patch. My mind just doesn't seem to know what to do with this story right now, but I swear to those of you who were victims of when I suddenly stopped "Four Year Reunion" that I will not stop "The American Student" until it's a finished story. It's just that right now I'm trying to keep the story going until I decide to put in the scene that basically signals the end of the story unless I add another turn that I'm thinking about. So, please review!!! It gives me inspiration and maybe my creativity will come back and my ADHD will let me concentrate for more than five-minute spurts of time. Thanks for reading!!!


	16. Storm

The American Student

A/N: Um, well I updated (after about two months of absence). I do have some reasons why this took so long, but those are in the ending author note, so if you want an explanation, that's where to look. I hope you enjoy the chapter! Please review.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

Chapter Sixteen: Storm

Neither girl spoke. They ate their breakfast in an ear-shattering silence, not wanting to bring up the subject of the date. The only sounds to be heard were those of spoons clinking against bowls as they ate their cereal, and the sound of the storm out side.

Yes, on the day that both Emily and Claire could have used a little sunshine outside, or even decent weather to spar outside in, it was raining heavy enough to keep even Hitsugaya off the roof and inside of Orihime's apartment where he couldn't keep tabs on the two Americans.

Emily stood up to put her bowl on the counter and began to head for the bedroom, but she then stopped.

_"Claire, are we gonna avoid the subject all day?"_ She finally asked to break the silence. She didn't look her friend in the eye, but her tone was firm. She'd only been up for half an hour and she was already sick of her friend avoiding the subject.

Claire didn't say anything at first. She just stared at her soggy cereal, stirring her breakfast with a plastic spoon.

Claire sighed, _"No, I guess we shouldn't avoid it."_ Neither of them liked the topic that came up this time every year, the topic of William Bard's death. It was a morbid subject, one that certainly didn't seem to belong with someone like Emily who was a generally…_enthusiastic_ person (not including mornings).

A flash of lightening followed by a large boom of thunder erupted from the sky and then the room went very dark. The sky was dark outside with clouds, which left no sunlight to illuminate the lightless room.

_"Power out, greeaaat,"_ Emily remarked as she sighed and got up to look for a flashlight. Then she paused. _"We do have a flashlight here, right?"_

_"Depends. Did you bring a flashlight when you came?"_ Claire asked. Emily shook her head. _"Then we don't have a flashlight."_ Emily stared at her normally prepared friend.

_"So out of all of our supplies for emergencies, we forgot to bring __**flashlights**__…?" _She asked, incredulity obvious in her tone.

_"Yep, sounds about right,"_ Claire confirmed, nodding her head, realizing that she probably should have thought to bring a flashlight. _Well_, she thought, _can't do anything about it now_.

For a while, no sound came from either of the two girls in the dark room. The storm rumbled on outside, and the electrical circuit remained broken. The only light came from the random flashes of thunder, for the sun was well hidden behind thick cloud cover.

_"What do we do now?"_ Emily said over the roar of thunder.

_"Wait out the storm, I guess,"_ Claire said with a shrug that Emily barely was able to see. Claire went back to eating her cereal, and thought she hear a noise resembling a head hitting a wall come from the room Emily had just walked into, but she chose to ignore it.

Some time later, both girls were dressed in jeans and t-shirts, sitting in the main room doing nothing but talking and eating pocky, the mood was much lighter than earlier—there wasn't much else to do in the dark with no flashlights or electricity.

_"Yeah, just like that time you fell in the lake when we were camping and me and Callie had to fish you out," _Claire said with a laugh.

_"At least when I fell in I was in a swimsuit. You were in normal clothing,"_ Emily pointed out as they continued the conversation, which had actually started out being one about how long the power outage might last.

_"But I only fell into it waist-deep. The only reason you had to help me out was 'cause my legs got stuck in the mud,"_ Claire reminded her friend, _"You managed to fall off the ski boat and into the middle of the lake so we had to help you back onto the boat from the water."_

_"You only had to help me back on because the boat had no ladder," _Emily said while taking a bite of her pocky.

_"Of __**course**__ that was the only reason. It __**couldn't**__ have had anything to do with that no matter how much you struggled, you couldn't pull yourself up and over the side of the boat on your own."_

_"No seven year-old can pull themselves over the side of a ski boat on their own!" _Emily protested.

_"Sure, sure. Of course."_ Claire laughed at bit. It had been a while since they'd just sat around and goofed off; the only things missing now were Midnight (1), who would sit on her lap, and Callie, who would be right there joking along with them. The thought made her wonder what was going on back at home, but she pushed the thought out of her mind.

Over in Orihime's apartment, they had flashlights. And candles—Claire and Emily also had candles, but they just hadn't thought to light them yet—which covered many of the flat surfaces in her apartment now to give light to the rooms. Even though the three occupants of this apartment had light, they were just as bored as the two girls living next door to them. Hitsugaya was never great company—being the tiny, too-serious midget that he was—and he was even worse when he was irritated by Matsumoto. Orihime sat quietly on the sidelines reading a book by flashlight.

"But, Tai_cho_," Matsumoto whined as she said the 'cho' in 'taicho', "The weather isn't that bad. I can still go shopping."

"Matsumoto," Hitsugaya said through clenched teeth, "The power is out here, it is storming outside, and presumably the power is out elsewhere in the city. What are the chances that the stores even still have power?" His eyebrows were furrowed from listening to his fukutaicho for the past three hours.

"But, Tai_cho_," Matsumoto again whined on the end of 'taicho'. Hitsugaya was ready to bang his head against the wall—or better yet, bang Matsumoto's head against the wall to shut her up—though only his furrowed eyebrows indicated this.

"Matsumoto," Hitsugaya said sharply, which to any outsider would seem odd considering it would like a ten year old reprimanding at an adult, "If you do not stop complaining, when we go back to Seireitei, I'll assign you a year's worth of paper work and no sake."

"Eh?! But, Taich—" One glance from Hitsugaya cut her off, "Fine…" she muttered, defeated.

Then, in both apartments, there were similar reactions as everyone who could sense reiatsu came to the same realization.

"_Hollow,"_ Claire announced out loud as she shot up and quickly put on her shoes; Emily did the same. Hitsugaya bolted out of his gigai and through the door at shunpo speed, and got to the hollow first.

Claire and Emily were distracted by the appearance of the hollow enough that they allowed two things to happen.

One: they didn't notice Hitsugaya's reiatsu until they were ten feet from where the hollow had stood before it was defeated.

The second was much worse.

As the two girls high-tailed it out of there, they were running like their lives were on the line. Then all of it seemed to happen simultaneously.

Hitsugaya noticed them.

Hitsugaya used shunpo and caught up.

Hitsugaya grabbed Emily's arm.

Emily, in the heat of the moment, automatically kicked Hitsugaya. Hard.

Hitsugaya released Emily as he fell back.

Hitsugaya got back up.

The two girls turned to face the white-haired shinigami.

Reality hit.

"Explanation. Now."

A/N: I'm sorry it's such a short chapter! It sort of needed to be, I guess. I think the next one will be longer.

As promised, the reasons for my lack of updating:

1. School. Tests. Band concert (I play the clarinet). A few projects.

2. Homework (this gets its own category).

3. Scholastic Bowl competitions (I'm a geek and proud of it) (my team won third in state for our division, by the way).

4. Distractions (various random ones)

5. Tetris. Need I say more?

6. Reading stuff.

7. Laziness

8. Lack of inspiration.

9. I got distracted writing other stuff (Vampire Knight one-shots and original stories that I may or may not post on my Fiction Press account)

10. The final top reason? Indecision. The version you have now read is the fifth version of this chapter. Because of how this chapter ended, this is going to change what I had intended for the story, so the next chapter might be a while. I just couldn't decide on this chapter for a while and I'm still iffy about this version.

Footnote:

(1)- Just in case you don't remember, Midnight is Claire's cat who was first mentioned in chapter two.

Hope you enjoyed the chapter! Please leave a review! They make me write faster (the only reason you got this chapter now is because I have gotten at least three messages from people asking I write faster or when I was going to update (you know who you are))


	17. Half Truth

The American Student

A/N: There is a reason why this chapter wasn't even two pages long (on Microsoft Works Word Processor which sucks, I want Microsoft Word back ASAP! I got a new laptop a couple of weeks ago, and it doesn't have Word, only Works), and I'll explain it at the end of this tiny chapter. Sorry for the shortness. Hope you like the chapter at least!

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

Chapter Seventeen: Half-Truth

Claire was a quick thinker, there was no denying that, but Hitsugaya had her trapped in a situation in which quick thinking wouldn't do much good. He knew for certain that they could see him-- kick him, too-- and he wanted his answers from the girls. Claire went through whatever scenario had come to mind (Running? He'd catch up with shunpo. Playing dumb? He had proof already. Knocking him out cold and _then_ running? Tempting to try, but difficult with him out of his gigai.) and she knew well enough to cut off the damage before he got more fact than he had to.

"I don't think an explanation is completely needed," Claire said, "I think the situation is fairly obvious." Emily stared, trying to catch onto what her friend had in mind.

"Humor me," The tiny taicho commanded. He suppressed a smirk, keeping his face looking disgruntled as usual. He had the girls trapped, but he was mildly suspicious still of Claire's cooperation.

"We can see spirits-- end of explanation," Claire answered.

"I figured that," Hitsugaya said, "But _why_ can you see spirits?"

"Beats us," Emily joined in once she caught on, "We just can."

"I don't see how this deeply affects a shinigami like yourself," Claire said in a business-like manner, "It's more our business than it is yours."

"Maybe it is, but it is still my business-- anything that has to do with spirits is a shinigami business," He reasoned.

Claire sighed. "I don't care if you think it's your business or not, but right now it's storming and Emily and I still need to buy flashlights and batteries. We're leaving." And so, despite Hitsugaya's protests against their sudden leave, the two sopping-wet girls walked through the storm to go get their flashlights and batteries. He wasn't happy about the lack of information he got from them, but some was better than none. He had the feeling they were holding something back, but he'd put up with the girls long enough to know that if he kept pressing for answers, he wouldn't get any at all.

_"Claire, are you sure that was such a great idea? Letting him know that much?" _Emily asked.

_"We couldn't do much else. You kicked him, there was no way we were going to get away without admitting something. This way, though, he didn't force more information out of us than we gave," _Claire explained, _"And he still doesn't know that I'm a shinigami."_

The girls decided that they actually should probably go get some flashlights, seeing as the rain wasn't letting up. They just stopped inside a small store on the way back to their apartment, bought what they needed, and left. They were both a little irked that they had to admit that they could see spirits to Hitsugaya-- it felt like losing, in a way-- but at the same time, they both felt the undeniable smugness one feels when they get away with a half-truth or a lie. Claire knew that they were by no means safe from further interrogation, yet, but by admitting to one thing, she figured that she had come very close to not having to reveal the rest.

"They actually admitted to it?" Matsumoto asked. Hitsugaya had returned a few minutes before and had told her about what had happened.

"They had to," Hitsugaya explained, "Once Lund kicked me, it was sort of obvious. But they are still hiding something, I think…Bard was way too cooperative for them to have been telling the whole truth. She has fought with me and lied to me for too long for her to just give up like this…they are definitely hiding something else." 

"Taicho," Matsumoto sighed, "Are you sure you aren't just seeing more than there is? They really might have been telling you the whole truth."

The white-haired shinigami shook his head. "There's no way they weren't hiding something." Matsumoto slumped backwards; she probably wasn't going to go shopping anytime soon.

A/N: As promised my reason for a tiny chapter instead of a larger one (which I had originally planned on writing): Well, first off, I once again failed to choose a version of the chapter-- so it took a while. I finally decided that, because I probably won't work on writing this for a little while, any one who reads this just might want an update, no matter how small (and probably badly written-- I've been having a hard time writing recently, don't know why…probably just the usual slight case of writer's block). Also, it sort of felt right after that last statement.

Now the main reason why I left this short: recently, a close family friend suffered a major stroke due to a blood clot in his brain which deprived the left side of his brain of blood. For those of you who don't know what the left side does, I'll tell you: the left side of the brain controls cognitive function (speech/language, memory/recognition). The last I heard, which was a few hours ago, he was still alive, but there was little to no function in the left side of his brain and his brain was swelling. So, now one of three things will happen:

1-- His wife decides that even if he lived, he would be suffering too much for the rest of his life (and it wouldn't be much of a life), and she lets him go so that he doesn't suffer.

2-- His wife tells the doctors to do what they can to save him; she doesn't want him to die, possibly thinks he will get better. He may never be able to speak again and he probably won't recognize his own wife.

3-- A miracle happens; he lives and gets better. He can talk pretty well and knows who his wife and friends are. At this point, this seems highly unlikely.

Mr. XXX was sort of a constant in my life, like an uncle, sort of; I see him more frequently than my real uncles. This guy is one of my dad's best friends and my dad and Mr. XXX went to college together, too. So I liked this guy, and when I heard the update I cried-- he was one of those people who just _aren't supposed to die_. So, I'm sort of depressed about this right now, and writing The American Student doesn't ever work well with depression-- I have an original story that works much better with negative feelings driving it.

I _really_ hope Mr. XXX doesn't die-- I want the miracle to happen. I've never seen his wife cry before, but I can only imagine how she must be feeling; a frown doesn't fit on her face well.

Well, anyhow, sorry for the really short chapter (and for writing about my problem, but I needed to vent), but I'll try to update when I get a half-decent chapter done. Please review, hope you liked the chapter!


	18. A Death to Remember

**The American Student**

**A/N:** No, it definitely hasn't been three months since my last update. Your eyes deceive you.

_NOTE: __For this chapter only__, English is in normal font, because there is no Japanese speech in this chapter so it made more sense to me to just have English in normal font instead of italics. __And the majority of the chapter is a flashback__, but I think that you readers can figure out where it starts and where it ends, so it won't be marked "flashback"._

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

Chapter Eighteen: A Death To Remember

As she laid on her bed, trying to fall asleep, Claire couldn't help but think about the last time she'd seen Will. It hadn't looked much like him at the time, but it had still been Will's gigai that was at the visitation and the funeral those two days. She couldn't help but recall the visitation, especially, because the first day was always the hardest. The first day was also the one you were most likely to remember.

Claire sat on the bench outside, she had to escape the inside of the building where everyone else was. One more hand shake, one more "I'm sorry", or one more hug, and she was going to burst. Not that the young six year-old hadn't already done her share of crying, but she was trying not to completely break; she wasn't as numb as she'd been the day before, she wasn't in denial, but it still felt like a horrible nightmare. William Bard was dead.

A man she didn't know walked up behind her and patted her on her back and whispered his condolences. Claire only nodded and stared out at the parking lot of the funeral home; it wasn't very pretty, but it was by far less stuffy than the interior of the house of death. Everyone inside was at least a little red around the eyes, yet they were smiling and telling stories, almost like nothing had happened; Claire disliked the atmosphere, it felt constricting. The atmosphere wasn't the worst part, though, the worst part was the body. It sat there, clearly William Bard, but it didn't look like him. Something wasn't right about the body, something invisible yet easily noticed; she couldn't figure it out.

Where was Emily? Claire had been waiting for her friend, and yet no sign of the rambunctious girl had been spotted. And so she sat and waited. For how long, she wasn't sure, but after what seemed like a very long time, she saw a black Taurus roll into the parking lot and instantly recognized the license plate. Standing up, she walked over to the Lunds' car and hugged her friend when she got out of the car.

"Hey," Emily greeted, wrapping her own arms around Claire as the rest of her family got out of the car.

"Hi," Claire replied. "It's horrible inside."

Pulling out of the hug, Emily looked down at Claire, being a good three or four inches taller than her friend at this point, and raised an eyebrow. "It's a visitation, dummy, what did you expect?"

"Not sure," Claire admitted. "I've never been to one before."

"Well, let's go inside for a little bit anyhow," Emily decided, her voice somber. "I want to see him again." With that, they followed the rest of Emily's family and went inside the brick building. To both Emily and Claire, the atmosphere was so thick with sorrow that it was nearly tangible. People were everywhere, and most of them had to be at _least_ eighty. It was constricting, so much so that it felt like it would be hard to breath, but the air came to their lungs fine.

Then they were in front of the "corpse", which both knew was Will's gigai. It had only a few marks on it, which the pathologists that had performed the autopsy had blamed on the fact that the body was found near a scraggly old tree, and that he had cut himself on that. The cause of death had, though in not as simple words, been blamed on organ failure. All of them. What caused the organs to fail, though, had been undetermined and then blamed on old age.

"Let's go back outside," Emily said quickly. "I don't like it in here." Claire found herself being dragged outside by her friend, and then they sat down on the cold bench. A thick blanket of silence covered the couple until Claire spoke up.

"What are we going to do now, Em?" Claire wondered. "Do you want to still train after this, or do you want to leave things be?"

"Same as we always do," Emily replied, "we'll keep going forward. We'll keep training, but without Will's help. We'll push forward. I'm surprised you even asked. Stop acting weak, it doesn't fit you."

"I'm not acting weak!" Claire protested. "It's just…"

"You don't want a repeat," the other girl finished for her. "Neither do I, and that's why we both have to get stronger. You can keep working towards that bankai-thing and I'll work on my abilities." Emily, satisfied with what she'd said, reached into her bag (which she was using as a purse) and pulled out a red box with a picture of some sort of candy-type picture on it.

"'Pocky'?" Claire read off the box. "What's that?"

"Some sort of Japanese candy; I found it at the store and decided to try it. It's pretty good. Want some?" She held out a thin stick covered in chocolate to her friend, and Claire accepted it. Eyeing it warily before taking a bite, she soon discovered that, like Emily had said, it was good. "See? I like it. I'll probably go buy another box of it tomorrow after the funeral."

"Yeah, you should," Claire agreed, distracted. The funeral. Would it be harder than the visitation? All she really knew was that it would be held outside in a park where Will had liked to take walks. She didn't like that it was being held outside, though, because then it would remind her even more of her nature-loving relative.

An gentle breeze blew, ruffling their hair and the fake trees in front of the dismal building. They sat in silence for a while, but it was a comfortable silence. It was a comforting silence in which both understood each other, and there were no words left to say. Sometimes, silence was better than words in these matters. Silence can say a lot, and in this case it expressed both their comfort for the other and their own sorrow. When the silence began to feel awkward, though, Claire spoke up.

"His body looked weird. Something wasn't right with it," she stated suddenly. Emily looked thoughtful for a moment.

"He wasn't smiling," she announced after a bit.

"What?"

"That's why he looked weird," Emily repeated, a bit quieter, "it's cause he was always smiling, even when he was frustrated with us."

And it was these words that remained in Claire's mind as she lay on her bed awake when she should have been sleeping. The night was dark and crickets chirped in the silence, both things only seeming to taunt her restless mind further. And it was her sleepless mind filled with memories that caused her to speak up.

"Hey, Em?" she asked the dark room. There was a shuffling noise as Emily turned over on the air mattress to view her friend's silhouette, she being just as wide awake as Claire.

"Yeah?" There was a small cracking noise in the darkness, changing Claire's direction of thought.

"Is the pocky next to you?" She wasn't sure whether or not to be amused by this.

"Maybe," Emily retorted. Then a pause. "Want some?"

"Sure." Again, a shuffling and a crinkling noise.

"Catch."

"Wha— OW!" The box smacked Claire dead center of her forehead before she grabbed it. Emily burst out laughing, and Claire grumbled a bit, but in the darkness an invisible irrepressible grin spread over her features. "Don't throw things in the dark, genius. I can't see them."

"Well that's your fault for not having better vision," Emily decided through her laughter. Then her voice softened and the laughter faded. "You were thinking about him, weren't you?"

Claire sighed, pulling out a stick of the comfort food. "Weren't you?"

"Of course. It's dark, you were silent, so what else was my mind going to wander to?"

"World domination? Building a midget army? I thought both were on the top of your to-do list."

"I don't need to think about those. I already have my plan laid out." Her voice was confident, sure, and obviously quivering from the suppressed laughter.

"Oh really? And what is it?" Claire challenged.

"That's obvious: hypnosis and my super-secret mind control skills. Duh."

"Oh really?" Claire, who was now trying to suppress her own laughter, asked.

"Really. And I suppose you'll want to help?"

"Oh, of course." Claire bit down on another piece of pocky before closing the box and dropping it to the floor. Conversation between the girls lasted until Emily yawned loudly and sighed.

"G'night, Claire," she said, snuggling into the mattress, a soft grin on her face.

"Night, Em."

**A/N:** So, still a pretty short chapter (sorry), but I'm satisfied that I managed to update at all. I don't know when the next chapter will be—it could remain without updates until Christmas break—but I'll try to get the chapters up as frequently as I can. With juggling school (I still need to figure out what each room in the new school is for) and my original story (I posted one on Fiction Press, which I also need to update), I'm trying. On the bright side, cross country season for me is over so I should have a little more time.

Please review!


	19. Things Not Anticipated

**The American Student **

**A/N:** Wow, has it really been that long since I last updated? Well, either way, here's a new chapter for those of you still reading this fic.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach, its characters, or anything associated with the series.**

Chapter Nineteen: Things Not Anticipated

* * *

Claire and Emily were both surprised how unpredictable weather could be. The night had gone without much more than a drizzle, but soon the downpour resumed. Thankfully, they had remembered umbrellas, and so they walked to school in the rain.

_"Hey, Claire?"_ Emily said, looking straight ahead.

Claire made a humming noise in reply, and that was all that was needed for Emily to continue.

_"You know Hitsugaya is smart enough to eventually figure out there's more too it, right?"_ Claire nodded. _"Well when he does find out, what do you think will happen?"_

She seemed to consider this for a while. _"He'll probably tell Seireitei, and then who knows what'll happen. We might be questioned, but I think they'll probably leave us alone. I mean, we haven't harmed anyone, we haven't done any damage to anything, so why should it matter?"_

_"Somehow, I don't think it's just that simple."_

---

The dreary weather outside was infinitely more interesting to Claire than the lesson on English figures of speech the class was getting. She knew her metaphors and sayings well—she didn't need to be told what 'off his/her rocker' meant, nor did she think they would need to know it; she thought teaching them what people meant when they said 'bite me' might be more useful.

Humming lightly under her breath, Emily was sketching out a picture of what seemed to be a unicorn, also ignoring the lesson completely. As she took her pencil and shaded in the horn, a rather bright flash of lighting lit up the room, followed closely by a clap of thunder. She paid it no mind, and continued to work on her sketch. This weather had been going on for some time, and she saw no reason to mind it.

Until the sirens went off, that is.

Emily looked up immediately, catching Claire's eyes as she too looked around; they both had the same question: what was going on?

"Tornado alarm," someone said loudly enough for her to hear. She saw Hitsugaya standing up from his desk and heading for the quickly forming line of students. Claire seemed to have heard, too, and both girls joined the line together.

They walked quickly through the hallways, seeing other classes along their way to what they guessed was the basement. The classes were all ushered into windowless classrooms and hallways, and took on the usual pose of what can be described as an on-the-knees fetal position with hands covering neck. Among the hustle-and-bustle they managed to hear the words "this is not a drill".

The not-a-drill didn't last long, and about twenty minutes later they were all back up in their respective classrooms. There were, of coursed, whispers about the strange event while coming into the classroom, but mostly things were settled.

Claire had to give this school some credit; back at her own school a fifteen minute tornado drill would have resulted in at least ten newly handed-out detentions for students and a twenty minute period of getting back to the classroom and doing nothing while waiting for everyone to get back and things to settle down.

So, the learning continued. One hour passed into the next, and lunch eventually arrived, which brought its own excitement. For, as soon as students were crowded into the cafeteria, the lights flickered and then went out quickly. The cafeteria, being in the center of the school, had no windows and it was quite dark until flashlights were pulled out and candles were lit.

Of course, you had the kids who over-reacted, the ones who took advantage of the situation and scared the hell out of others, and then you had the few who just went _quiet_.

Emily was none of these. She leaned into their table, grinning, and quickly explained the rules to a game.

"So," she concluded, "anyone up for Ghost in the Graveyard?"

---

The power never did come back on that day. The rest of their lessons were conducted in the dark of the storm, lit up eerily by candles and the occasional flash of lightning. The rain grew louder as it poured harder throughout the day, until finally the sound of the teacher's voice could barely be heard over the roaring weather.

So, needless to say, walking back home wasn't too pleasant. Umbrellas were useless in the face of the wind and rain, which blew the icy water right at their faces and soaked them through. Because of this, as soon as Claire and Emily got home, they changed out of their uniforms and into casual wear, and Claire wrapped her hair up into a towel because their power had gone out because of the storm (again) and as such she couldn't blow-dry her hair. Emily's hair wasn't long enough to wrap up, so she let it hang damp.

_"It's dark, it's raining, the power is out, and I'm _freezing_," _Claire griped, not in the best of moods. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a soggy red box. _"And the pocky got wet."_

While Claire was going through her damp bag, Emily was trying to get their radio (battery operated, of course) to tune to a local news station or anything else that might be giving weather updates. She had been completely unsuccessful so far, much to her frustration. It wasn't until about twenty minutes of moving the antenna and radio about the room and scanning the stations did she finally get a half-decent signal through the downpour, and managed to make out a man saying that the storm had come from nowhere and was hovering over Karakura and the surrounding areas with no foreseeable plans of moving. Some businesses had even closed because the weather was so terrible.

_"Claire, there's something not right about this storm,"_ Emily said, frowning. _"Why isn't it moving? Why is it centered over the city? Why can nobody figure out what caused it? It makes no sense."_

Claire looked over towards Emily, momentarily distracted from trying to dry off her things. _"It isn't moving?"_

Emily shook her head. _"Not an inch, unless you count the fact that its perimeter keeps growing, but the center is remaining the same. There is something unnatural about it. You don't think…?"_

_"That a spirit could be causing this? It might, but I don't sense anything."_

_"I don't either, but that worries me more than anything else."_

---

"Taicho…" Matsumoto dragged out in complaint. "Do we have to keep watch in this weather? I can barely even see anything."

"Information from Seireitei says that a strong hollow was detected coming into the world of the living, but never detected leaving. There's a good chance it's hiding itself around here," Hitsugaya reminded her. "We have to keep watch, even in the storm. "Don't forget that the storm itself is very likely being caused by the hollow."

The information had been more serious, actually, than Hitsugaya let on. It was why he was tenser than usual, preferring to remain outside rather than wait for a sign while waiting indoors; he had been told that there was a high probability that this 'hollow' was more specifically an arrancar because the energy signature had been slightly different from a normal hollow's reiatsu. And so, Hitsugaya was ready to fight with full force.

Suddenly, a large reiatsu flared up and Hitsugaya, followed by Matsumoto, raced off towards it. They in the park—Hitsugaya made a mental note to have the twelfth division check out this area to look for any specific reason why the hollow were drawn to the park the most—and Renji, Rukia, and Ichigo were already fighting them.

Hitsugaya furrowed his eyebrows as he unsheathed Hyourinmaru and immediately released his shikai, ready for a tough fight now that his concerns had been confirmed. Not one, but _three_ arrancar were fighting fiercely with the shinigami, and more menos grande were coming in, followed by other hollows. Even as the rest of the Karakura-based shinigami showed up, they were being spread thin just by the sheer _number_ of enemies.

Fighting skillfully, Hitsugaya was completely focused; nothing took his attention away from the enemy at hand.

Nothing, that is, until the last two people he would have wanted to see right then showed up.

Emily and Claire were ready to fight.

"Both of you go home!" Hitsugaya shouted as he dodged a strike. "You'll only get in the way."

The girls were ignoring him, though, as both went to battle. Claire had pulled out her zanpakto and was slicing open hollow, while Emily fought equally hard. The hollows just kept _coming_, and the rain made visibility crap and made the grass slick and muddy. It was overall terrible conditions for fighting, but they never gave in, and Hitsugaya gave up shouting at the two girls to leave—he had more important things to worry about.

Claire struck her sword just past the white-haired captain's head, effectively killing the hollow that was just about to attack the occupied Hitsugaya.

He locked eyes with her for a moment. "We'll talk later."

She smirked, not having expected any different. "Of course."

Soon the flow of hollow seemed to cease, and they were defeated quickly and easily, as were the menos (though not as quickly or as easily). All that was left to do was defeat the arrancar, which had unfortunately stayed alive seeing as there were so many other hollows to take care of.

So what did Claire do? Without thinking, she released her shikai and went straight for the nearest arrancar. Emily, trying to heal a gaping wound on her own arm, didn't have time to remind Claire that the arrancar were stronger than the other hollows they'd encountered so far.

The arrancar, which appeared to be male, easily avoided the vines of fire, ice, and stone, simply jumping up and collecting reiatsu beneath himself so he could stay in the air where it was much, much easier to dodge Claire's attacks, both those from her and her zanpakto. Realizing that this wasn't going to work, she recalled her shikai and, holding her sword in her right hand, plunged it into her left arm.

_"You idiot!"_ Emily screeched, watching as thinner, nimbler vines of a dark scarlet color unfurled from her friends arm, and actually managed to touch the arrancar, though not really hurt him. It was about then that Hitsugaya stepped in.

"Stay out of this Bard, you cannot defeat him," Hitsugaya said, stepping in front of Claire.

"None of you can defeat me," the arrancar spoke. "Aizen-sama's followers are stronger than shinigami will ever be."

"We'll see about that," Claire said, ready to lash out again, but this time Emily grabbed Claire and held her back.

_"He's stronger than you are Claire. I won't just sit here and watch you get yourself killed."_

But Claire ignored the warnings of both her friend and Hitsugaya and went for a head-on strike. In return, she got a solid punch to her stomach that sent her flying backwards and coughing up blood-tinted saliva as she hurried to get up, staggering a bit as she did so. Stand she did, though, and began to pick up speed for another attack on the arrancar that Hitsugaya was now in battle with. She landed a vine-covered kick on the arrancar, but it wasn't enough to even make him wince. He simply grabbed her retracting leg and flung her harshly into a tree, where Emily heard a disconcerting snap. This time, it took Claire much longer to stand, her body taking damage from both the arrancar and the pain that her seal inflicted when she used this much reiatsu. Her vision was blurring black, but she pulled herself up again as Emily ran over to her and tried to convince her to just sit back down. It was like convincing a starving person not to eat, though, and Claire trudged back towards the battle, and then simply stopped. Her zanpakto slowly melted out of her arm and solidified into her hand, leaving her arm still with a horrible wound, and she breathed deeply.

_"I'm going to try it,"_ she said slowly. _"I've got to try it. I know I can do it."_

Emily was dumbfounded. _"You haven't mastered it at all, though! You haven't accomplished it even once! Even if you do get it to work… Claire, this is crazy!"_

Claire just grinned, though, and plunged her sword into the ground.

* * *

**A/N:** Well, there was the chapter I just finished today. I know, it wasn't that good, and I probably could do better if I had more motivation to work on this. Well, whatever, I'm determined to finish this!

Thanks for reading! Please review!


End file.
